Plasmonic superlensing in doped GaAs.

Fehrenbacher, Markus; Winnerl, Stephan; Schneider, Harald; Döring, Jonathan; Kehr, Susanne C; Eng, Lukas M; Huo, Yongheng; Schmidt, Oliver G et al. · Nano Lett · 2015

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

We demonstrate a semiconductor based broadband near-field superlens in the mid-infrared regime. Here, the Drude response of a highly doped n-GaAs layer induces a resonant enhancement of evanescent waves accompanied by a significantly improved spatial resolution at radiation wavelengths around λ = 20 μm, adjustable by changing the doping concentration. In our experiments, gold stripes below the GaAs superlens are imaged with a λ/6 subwavelength resolution by an apertureless near-field optical microscope utilizing infrared radiation from a free-electron laser. The resonant behavior of the observed superlensing effect is in excellent agreement with simulations based on the Drude-Lorentz model. Our results demonstrate a rather simple superlens implementation for infrared nanospectroscopy.