One of the most rapidly growing areas of physics and nanotechnology focuses on plasmonic effects on the nanometre scale, with possible applications ranging from sensing and biomedicine to imaging and information technology. However, the full development of nanoplasmonics is hindered by the lack of devices that can generate coherent plasmonic fields. It has been proposed that in the same way as a laser generates stimulated emission of coherent photons, a 'spaser' could generate stimulated emission of surface plasmons (oscillations of free electrons in metallic nanostructures) in resonating metallic nanostructures adjacent to a gain medium. But attempts to realize a spaser face the challenge of absorption loss in metal, which is particularly strong at optical frequencies. The suggestion to compensate loss by optical gain in localized and propagating surface plasmons has been implemented recently and even allowed the amplification of propagating surface plasmons in open paths. Still, these experiments and the reported enhancement of the stimulated emission of dye molecules in the presence of metallic nanoparticles lack the feedback mechanism present in a spaser. Here we show that 44-nm-diameter nanoparticles with a gold core and dye-doped silica shell allow us to completely overcome the loss of localized surface plasmons by gain and realize a spaser. And in accord with the notion that only surface plasmon resonances are capable of squeezing optical frequency oscillations into a nanoscopic cavity to enable a true nanolaser, we show that outcoupling of surface plasmon oscillations to photonic modes at a wavelength of 531 nm makes our system the smallest nanolaser reported to date-and to our knowledge the first operating at visible wavelengths. We anticipate that now it has been realized experimentally, the spaser will advance our fundamental understanding of nanoplasmonics and the development of practical applications.

We report the suppression of loss of surface plasmon polariton propagating at the interface between silver film and optically pumped polymer with dye. The large magnitude of the effect enables a variety of applications of 'active' nanoplasmonics. The experimental study is accompanied by the analytical description of the phenomenon. In particular, we resolve the controversy regarding the direction of the wavevector of a wave with a strong evanescent component in an active medium.

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We have developed a simple method to fabricate lamellar metal-dielectric hyperbolic metamaterials on flat, flexible, and curvilinear substrates, which allows for functionalization of dielectric layers by dye molecules. The control of spontaneous emission of dye molecules with hyperbolic metamaterials has been studied in two different sample configurations, and the effect has been found to be much stronger when emitters are placed inside the metamaterial rather than on its surface.

We have observed the compensation of loss in a metal by a gain in a dielectric medium in the mixture of an Ag aggregate and a Rhodamine 6G dye. The demonstrated sixfold enhancement of the Rayleigh scattering is the evidence of the enhancement of the surface-plasmon resonance. The reported experimental observation facilitates many applications of nanoplasmonics.

We show that despite of low loss, silver and gold are not suitable for a variety of nanoplasmonic applications in the infrared range, which require compact modes in single-interface plasmonic waveguides. At the same time, degenerate wide-band-gap semiconductors can serve as high-quality plasmonic materials at telecom wavelengths, combining fairly high compactness and relatively low loss. Their plasmonic properties in the near-infrared can be compared to those of gold in the visible range. The same materials can be used in a variety of non-plasmonic metamaterials applications, including transformation optics and invisibility cloaking.

We have shown that alloying a noble metal (gold) with another metal (cadmium), which can contribute two electrons per atom to a free electron gas, can significantly improve the metal's optical properties in certain wavelength ranges and make them worse in the other parts of the spectrum. In particular, in the gold-cadmium alloy we have demonstrated a significant expansion of the spectral range of metallic reflectance to shorter wavelengths. The experimental results and the predictions of the first principles theory demonstrate an opportunity for the improvement and optimization of low-loss metals for nanoplasmonic and metamaterials applications.

Proximity to metallic surfaces, plasmonic structures, cavities and other inhomogeneous dielectric environments is known to control spontaneous emission, energy transfer, scattering, and many other phenomena of practical importance. The aim of the present study was to demonstrate that, in spirit of the Marcus theory, the rates of chemical reactions can, too, be influenced by nonlocal dielectric environments, such as metallic films and metal/dielectric bilayer or multilayer structures. We have experimentally shown that metallic, composite metal/dielectric substrates can, indeed, control ordering as well as photodegradation of thin poly-3-hexylthiophene (p3ht) films. In many particular experiments, p3ht films were separated from metal by a dielectric spacer, excluding conventional catalysis facilitated by metals and making modification of the nonlocal dielectric environment a plausible explanation for the observed phenomena. This first step toward understanding of a complex relationship between chemical reactions and nonlocal dielectric environments is to be followed by the theory development and a broader scope of thorough experimental studies.