Nanomanipulation with Designer Thermoplasmonic Metasurface

Abstract

Plasmonic nanoantennas provide an efficient platform to confine electromagnetic energy to the deeply subwavelength scales. The resonant absorption of light by the plasmonic nanoantennas provides the means to engineer heat distribution at the micro and nanoscales. We present thermoplasmonic metasurfaces for on-chip trapping, dynamic manipulation and sensing of micro and nanoscale objects. This ability to rapidly concentrate objects on the surface of the metasurface holds promise to overcome the diffusion limit in surface-based optical biosensors. This platform could be applied for the trapping and label-free sensing of viruses, biological cells and extracellular vesicles such as exosomes.