Fano resonance arising from the interaction between a broad "bright" mode and a narrow "dark" mode has been widely investigated in symmetry-breaking structures made of noble metals such as plasmonic asymmetric oligomers or other well-designed nanostructures. However, Fano resonance in nanoscale all-dielectric dimers has not been experimentally demonstrated so far. We report the first experimental observation of directional Fano resonance in silicon nanosphere dimers (both homodimer and heterodimer) and clarify that the coupling between magnetic and electric dipole modes can easily generate Fano resonance in all-dielectric oligomers, distinctly differing from conventional Fano resonances based on electric responses or artificial optical magnetism. A silicon nanosphere dimer, exhibiting a strong magnetic response inside and an electric enhancement in the gap, is an excellent structure to support magnetic-based Fano scattering. Interactions between magnetic and electric dipoles can suppress backward scattering and enhance forward scattering at Fano wavelengths. This directional scattering is much more prominent than that from a single silicon sphere and shows promising applications in areas such as directional nanoantenna or optical switching, opening up avenues for developing all-dielectric low-loss metamaterials or nanophotonic devices at visible wavelengths.

Tellurium nanoparticles are used for broadband solar energy harvesting and efficient photothermal conversion.

Due to their optical magnetic and electric resonances associated with the high refractive index, dielectric silicon nanoparticles have been explored as novel nanocavities that are excellent candidates for enhancing various light-matter interactions at the nanoscale. Here, from both of theoretical and experimental aspects, we explored resonance coupling between excitons and magnetic/electric resonances in heterostructures composed of the silicon nanoparticle coated with a molecular J-aggregate shell. The resonance coupling was originated from coherent energy transfer between the exciton and magnetic/electric modes, which was manifested by quenching dips on the scattering spectrum due to formation of hybrid modes. The influences of various parameters, including the molecular oscillation strength, molecular absorption line width, molecular shell thickness, refractive index of the surrounding environment, and separation between the core and shell, on the resonance coupling behaviors were scrutinized. In particular, the resonance coupling can approach the strong coupling regime by choosing appropriate molecular parameters, where an anticrossing behavior with a mode splitting of 100 meV was observed on the energy diagram. Most interestingly, the hybrid modes in such dielectric heterostructure can exhibit unidirectional light scattering behaviors, which cannot be achieved by those in plexcitonic nanoparticle composed of a metal nanoparticle core and a molecular shell.

α-Ag2WO4 (AWO) has been studied extensively due to its H2 evolution and organic pollution degradation ability under the irradiation of UV light. However, the band gap of AWO is theoretically calculated to be 3.55 eV, resulting in its sluggish reaction to visible light. Herein, we demonstrated that, by using the electronic reconstruction of AWO nanorods upon a unique process of laser irradiation in liquid, these nanorods performed good visible-light photocatalytic organics degradation and H2 evolution. Using commercial AWO powders as the starting materials, we achieved the electronic reconstruction of AWO by a recrystallization of the starting powders upon laser irradiation in liquid and synthesized AWO nanorods. Due to the weak bond energy of AWO and the far from thermodynamic equilibrium process created by laser irradiation in liquid, abundant cluster distortions, especially [WO6] cluster distortions, are introduced into the crystal lattice, the defect density increases by a factor of 2.75, and uneven intermediate energy levels are inset into the band gap, resulting in a 0.44 eV decrease of the band gap, which modified the AWO itself by electronic reconstruction to be sensitive to visible light without the addition of others. Further, the first-principles calculation was carried out to clarify the electronic reconstruction of AWO, and the theoretical results confirmed the deduction based on the experimental measurements.

Light–matter resonance coupling is a long-studied topic for both fundamental research and photonic and optoelectronic applications. Here we investigated the resonance coupling between the magnetic dipole mode of a dielectric nanosphere and 2D excitons in a monolayer semiconductor. By coating an individual silicon nanosphere with a monolayer of WS2, we theoretically demonstrated that, because of the strong energy transfer between the magnetic dipole mode of the nanosphere and the A-exciton in WS2, resonance coupling evidenced by anticrossing behavior in the scattering energy diagram was observed, with a mode splitting of 43 meV. In contrast to plexcitons, which involve plasmonic nanocavities, the resonance coupling in this all-dielectric heterostructure was insensitive to the spacing between the silicon nanosphere core and the WS2 shell. Additionally, the two split modes exhibited distinct light-scattering directionality. We further experimentally demonstrated the resonance coupling effect by depositing silicon nanospheres with different diameters onto a WS2 monolayer and collecting the scattering spectra of the resulting heterostructures under ambient conditions. We further demonstrated active control of the resonance coupling by temperature scanning. Our findings highlighted the potential of our all-dielectric heterostructure as a solid platform for studying strong light–matter interactions at the nanoscale.

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