A self-organized anisotropic liquid-crystal plasmonic metamaterial.

Dintinger, José; Tang, Bai-Jia; Zeng, Xianbing; Liu, Feng; Kienzler, Tobias; Mehl, Georg H; Ungar, Goran; Rockstuhl, Carsten et al. · Adv Mater · 2013

basic_science · Level V

Where this comes from

Abstract

A composite material that leads to self organization of mesogen-coated gold nanospheres is synthesized and shows enhanced anisotropic optical properties due to synergistic effects of the mesogens intrinsic birefringence and its ability to drive the self-assembly process into highly anisotropic architectures with densely packed nanospheres. Such nanoengineered matter sustains a response beyond that achievable by its individual constituents, i.e., a metamaterial.