Plasmonic sensors are extremely promising candidates for label-free single-molecule analysis but require exquisite control over the physical arrangement of metallic nanostructures. Here we employ self-assembly based on the DNA origami technique for accurate positioning of individual gold nanoparticles. Our innovative design leads to strong plasmonic coupling between two 40 nm gold nanoparticles reproducibly held with gaps of 3.3±1 nm. This is confirmed through far field scattering measurements on individual dimers which reveal a significant red shift in the plasmonic resonance peaks, consistent with the high dielectric environment due to the surrounding DNA. We use surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) to demonstrate local field enhancements of several orders of magnitude through detection of a small number of dye molecules as well as short single-stranded DNA oligonucleotides. This demonstrates that DNA origami is a powerful tool for the high-yield creation of SERS-active nanoparticle assemblies with reliable sub-5 nm gap sizes.

Gold nanoparticles are separated above a planar gold film by 1.1 nm thick self-assembled molecular monolayers of different conductivities. Incremental replacement of the nonconductive molecules with a chemically equivalent conductive version differing by only one atom produces a strong 50 nm blue-shift of the coupled plasmon. With modeling this gives a conductance of 0.17G0 per biphenyl-4,4′-dithiol molecule and a total conductance across the plasmonic junction of 30G0. Our approach provides a reliable tool quantifying the number of molecules in each plasmonic hotspot, here <200.

The precise structural details of metallic nanogaps within optical antennae are found to dramatically modify the plasmonic response, producing a complex pattern of electromagnetic modes that can be directly observed in scattering experiments. We analyze this situation theoretically in the nanoparticle-on-mirror construct, which forms a plasmonic nanogap sensitive to even atomic-scale restructuring of nanoparticle morphology. We focus on the effect of nanoparticle faceting, which allows the formation of ultrathin cavities between the particle and the underlying metallic film in the nanoparticle-on-mirror geometry. Two different sets of modes are identified: longitudinal antenna modes, which are strongly radiative and excited for all facet width ranges, and transverse cavity modes produced at large facets and exhibiting extreme confinement. The interaction and hybridization of antenna and cavity modes is determined by their symmetry and the precise morphology of the nanogap edges. Understanding such complex optics from nanoparticle-on-mirror structures is important to elucidate a wide variety of emerging photochemical and optoelectronic processes.

Nanomaterials find increasing application in communications, renewable energies, electronics and sensing. Because of its unsurpassed speed and highly tuneable interaction with matter, using light to guide the self-assembly of nanomaterials can open up novel technological frontiers. However, large-scale light-induced assembly remains challenging. Here we demonstrate an efficient route to nano-assembly through plasmon-induced laser threading of gold nanoparticle strings, producing conducting threads 12±2 nm wide. This precision is achieved because the nanoparticles are first chemically assembled into chains with rigidly controlled separations of 0.9 nm primed for re-sculpting. Laser-induced threading occurs on a large scale in water, tracked via a new optical resonance in the near-infrared corresponding to a hybrid chain/rod-like charge transfer plasmon. The nano-thread width depends on the chain mode resonances, the nanoparticle size, the chain length and the peak laser power, enabling nanometre-scale tuning of the optical and conducting properties of such nanomaterials.

Nanometer-sized gaps between plasmonically coupled adjacent metal nanoparticles enclose extremely localized optical fields, which are strongly enhanced. This enables the dynamic investigation of nanoscopic amounts of material in the gap using optical interrogation. Here we use impinging light to directly tune the optical resonances inside the plasmonic nanocavity formed between single gold nanoparticles and a gold surface, filled with only yoctograms of semiconductor. The gold faces are separated by either monolayers of molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) or two-unit-cell thick cadmium selenide (CdSe) nanoplatelets. This extreme confinement produces modes with 100-fold compressed wavelength, which are exquisitely sensitive to morphology. Infrared scattering spectroscopy reveals how such nanoparticle-on-mirror modes directly trace atomic-scale changes in real time. Instabilities observed in the facets are crucial for applications such as heat-assisted magnetic recording that demand long-lifetime nanoscale plasmonic structures, but the spectral sensitivity also allows directly tracking photochemical reactions in these 2-dimensional solids.

Despite the availability of elaborate varieties of nanoparticles, their assembly into regular superstructures and photonic materials remains challenging. Here we show how flexible films of stacked polymer nanoparticles can be directly assembled in a roll-to-roll process using a bending-induced oscillatory shear technique. For sub-micron spherical nanoparticles, this gives elastomeric photonic crystals termed polymer opals showing extremely strong tunable structural colour. With oscillatory strain amplitudes of 300%, crystallization initiates at the wall and develops quickly across the bulk within only five oscillations. The resulting structure of random hexagonal close-packed layers is improved by shearing bidirectionally, alternating between two in-plane directions. Our theoretical framework indicates how the reduction in shear viscosity with increasing order of each layer accounts for these results, even when diffusion is totally absent. This general principle of shear ordering in viscoelastic media opens the way to manufacturable photonic materials, and forms a generic tool for ordering nanoparticles.

Multiplexed or simultaneous detection of multiple analytes is a valuable tool in many analytical applications. However, complications caused by the presence of interfering compounds in a sample form a major drawback in existing molecular sensor technologies, particularly in multi-analyte systems. Although separating analytes through extraction or chromatography can partially address the problem of interferents, there remains a need for developing direct observational tools capable of multiplexing that can be applied in situ. Surface-enhanced Raman Spectroscopy (SERS) is an optical molecular finger-printing technique that has the ability to resolve analytes from within mixtures. SERS has attracted much attention for its potential in multiplexed sensing but it has been limited in its quantitative abilities. Here, we report a facile supramolecular SERS-based method for quantitative multiplex analysis of small organic molecules in aqueous environments such as human urine.

Plasmonic coupling of gold nanoparticles to a gold surface creates intense plasmonic hot spots with large electromagnetic field-enhancements within the cavity formed by the two metallic surfaces. The localised field in such structures is extremely sensitive to morphological fluctuations and subtle changes in the dielectric properties of the cavity contents. Here, we present an optical method that pins down the properties of the gap contents with high sensitivity, termed normalising plasmon resonance (NPR) spectroscopy. We use this on a variety of ultrathin molecular spacers such as filled and empty cucurbiturils, and graphene. Clear differences in the spectral positions and intensities of plasmonic modes observed in the scattering spectrum resolve thickness differences of 0.1 nm, and refractive index changes from molecular filling.