Photoluminescence enhancement of carbon dots by Ag nanoparticles in thin-film hybrid structures

ABSTRACT

The plasmon enhancement of carbon dots (CDs) photoluminescence (PL) in thin-film structures with metal nanoparticles is of interest in their practical applications in sensors and light-emitters. This paper investigates CDs in the thin-film structures with nanogranulated silver films with different thickness. CDs in an aqueous solution were precipitated by spin-coating over the surface of annealed Ag films coated previously by a polymer layer. The IR, optical density and PL spectra of free-CDs and in thin-film structures with Ag films were studied. The PL intensity enhancement of CDs was demonstrated in the thin-film structures with Ag films due to absorption cross-section enhancement and the action of the Purcell effect. The improvement of thin-film structures producing technology will contribute to PL enhancement of CDs and the development of new thin-film sensors, light-emitters and other devices on their base.

KEYWORDS:

• Carbon dots
• Ag nanoparticles
• optical density
• photoluminescence

Acknowledgements

The authors thank Dr I.A. Gladskikh and Dr P.S. Parfenov for technical assistance.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation: [Grant Number 08-08].