Manipulating the distribution of electric field intensity to effectively enhance the spatial and spectral fluorescence intensity of fluorescent nanodiamonds

Abstract

Fluorescent nanodiamonds (FNDs) having nitrogen-vacancy (NV) centers have drawn much attention for their biocompatibility and stable optical properties. Nevertheless, the NV centers are located in the interior of the FNDs, and it has not been possible to increase the fluorescence intensity of FNDs efficiently using previously developed enhancement methods. In this paper, we present a simple nanocavity structure that enhances the fluorescence intensity of FNDs. The designed Al/SiO₂ nanocavities are stable and inexpensive, and provide a large region for efficient enhancement of fluorescence that can cover most 100 nm FNDs. By tuning the thickness of the capping SiO₂ layer of the Al/SiO₂ nanocavities, the distributions of both the spatial and spectral electric field intensities of the FNDs could be controlled and manipulated. In general, the FNDs were excited using a green-yellow laser; the broadband fluorescence of the FNDs comprised the emissions from neutral (NV⁰) and negatively charged (NV⁻) NV centers. To enhance the fluorescence intensity from the NV⁻ centers of the FNDs, we designed an Al/70 nm SiO₂ nanocavity to function at excitation and emission wavelengths of 633 and 710 nm, respectively, allowing the NV⁻ centers to be excited efficiently; as a result, we achieved an enhancement in fluorescence intensity of 11.2-fold. Moreover, even when we covered 100 nm FNDs with polyglycerol (forming p-FND), the fluorescence intensities of the p-FND particles placed on the nanocavities remained greatly enhanced.