Rice researchers make ultrasensitive conductivity measurements

Researchers at Rice University have discovered a new way to make ultrasensitive conductivity measurements at optical frequencies on high-speed nanoscale electronic components.

The research at Rice’s Laboratory for Nanophotonics (LANP) is described online in a new study in the American Chemical Society’s journal ACS Nano. In a series of experiments, LANP researchers linked pairs of puck-shaped metal nanodisks with metallic nanowires and showed how the flow of current at optical frequencies through the nanowires produced “charge transfer plasmons” with unique optical signatures.

“The push to continually increase the speed of microchip components has researchers looking at nanoscale devices and components that operate at optical frequencies for next-generation electronics,” said LANP Director Naomi Halas, the lead scientist on the study. “It is not well-known how these materials and components operate at extremely high frequencies of light, and LANP’s new technique provides a way to measure the electrical transport properties of nanomaterials and structures at these extremely high frequencies.”

Read more: http://www.nanotechnologyworld.org/#!Rice-researchers-make-ultrasensitive-conductivity-measurements/c89r/5578553e0cf2df2eae412b28