Formation of normal surface plasmon modes in small sodium nanoparticles

Abstract

Formation of surface plasmon modes in sodium nanoclusters containing 20–300 atoms was studied using the G₀W₀ approximation. It is shown that in the small Na nanoparticles up to 2 nm in size, the loss function Im[ε⁻¹] is dominated by a single peak corresponding to localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR). For particles of 2 nm and more, a resonance corresponding to surface plasmon polariton (SPP) oscillations begins to form, as well as a resonance corresponding to volume plasmon (VP) excitations. Considering the above, the linear size of a particle in the range of 0.7–3.7 nm can be estimated as the lower limit for metal nanodevices operating with SPPs. On the example of spherical nanoparticles consisting of a silicon core coated with sodium atoms, it is shown that the LSPR mode is selectively suppressed while the SPP mode is not. Such composite structures can be considered as an example of nanoplasmonic devices with selectively tuned characteristics.