Fabrication of large-area plasmonic nanostructures for surface enhanced fluorescence

Two different types of large-area plasmonic nanostructures are fabricated on a silicon wafer and on a glass substrate for surface enhanced fluorescence. Ag coated silicon spikes are formed on a silicon substrate by cryogenic inductively coupled plasma reactive ion etching together with e-beam evaporation, and Ag nanoparticles are embedded in glass by two-step ion exchange. Both of them are demonstrated to enhance the light emission of fluorescence by using rhodamin 6G as the analyte. The presented fabrication methods are simple, low-cost and suitable for large-scale fabrication, providing a possibility to make substrates with improved fluorescence sensitivity for commercial applications.