Sharif Digital Repository

In this paper, a plasmonic-photonic nanostructure has been introduced for efficient unidirectional coupling of free-space radiation to surface plasmon polariton (SPP) waves under normal illumination on a subwavelength slit. The structure consists of a conventional metallic slit-groove nanostructure integrated with a plasmonic waveguide to support SPP waves along the desired direction with a remarkable lateral confinement. The unidirectional coupling is achieved by using an integrated plasmonic distributed reflector designed under Bragg condition. This reflector basically distributes part of the light coupled through the slit into the SPP modes of the waveguide. Numerical simulations show... 

We propose an innovative design for metallic slit-groove nanostructure to increase the propagation intensity of a unidirectional Surface Plasmon Polariton (SPP) light beam. Our idea is based on the combination of the concept of unidirectional plasmonic wave propagation in a metallic slit-groove nanostructure and the well-known hybrid modes of a hybrid metal-dielectric waveguide. Our results demonstrate that the hybrid structure results in up to 5 times enhancement in the SPP beam intensity relative to the conventional design of slit-groove nanostructure. This new design of SPP based nano source can be applied in many applications including nano photonic devices  

Metallic nanoparticles (NPs) have not been effective in improving the overall performance of the cells with micrometer-thick absorbing layers mainly due to the parasitic optical dissipation in the metal. Here, using both experiment and theory, we demonstrate that aggregates of metallic NPs enhance the light absorption of dye-sensitized solar cells of a few micrometer-thick light absorbing layers. The composite electrode containing the optimal concentration of 5 wt% Au@SiO2 aggregates shows the enhancement of 80% and 52% in external quantum efficiency and photocurrent density, respectively. The superior performance of the aggregates relative to NP is attributed to their larger scattering... 

Recent progress in the development of bismuth vanadate (BiVO4) photoanodes has firmly established it as a promising material for solar water splitting applications. Performance limitations due to intrinsically poor catalytic activity and slow electron transport have been successfully addressed through the application of water oxidation co-catalysts and novel doping strategies. The next bottleneck to tackle is the modest optical absorption in BiVO4, particularly close to its absorption edge of 2.4 eV. Here, we explore the modification of the BiVO4 surface with Ag@SiO2 core-shell plasmonic nanoparticles. A photocurrent enhancement by a factor of ∼2.5 is found under 1 sun illumination (AM1.5).... 

The surface plasmon effect of Au nanostructures placed on the surface of hematite has recently been used to enhance light absorption within its carrier collection distance of 10 nm from the water-hematite interface. Despite significant narrow band absorption enhancements in the visible region, the reported enhancements in the overall performance of the cell under standard AM1.5 sunlight illumination are not significant. We numerically design an array of Au stripes on the surface of an extremely thin layer of hematite to maximize the number of charge carriers that can reach the hematite-water interface and explore the optical processes involved. The lateral dimensions and in particular the... 

Spherical dielectric particles, nanofibers, and nanorods have been widely used as embedded scattering objects in nanostructured thin film solar cells. Here we propose micron-scale rod-like dielectric particles as a more effective alternative to the spherical ones for light trapping in thin film solar cells. The superior performance of these micro-rods is attributed to their larger scattering efficiency relative to the spherical particles as evidenced by full-wave optical calculations. Using a one-pot process, 1.7 μm-long bullet-shaped silica rods with 330 nm diameter are synthesized and their concentration in a N719-sensitized solar cell is optimized. A solar cell with an optimal... 

Embedded dielectric scatterers comprise an important approach for light trapping in dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs) due to their simple fabrication process. The challenge in applying these scatterers lies in finding the optimal dimensions and concentration of the scatterers. This requires many experiments and it is often quite difficult to have a starting point for optimizing the concentration. Based on theories of light propagation in random media, we propose a simple model for DSCs with embedded silica spherical particles. Then, by full-wave optical calculations, we determine a narrow range for the concentration of silica particles that leads to the largest optical absorption in the... 

Dielectric scattering particles have widely been used as embedded scattering elements in dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs) to improve the optical absorption of the device. Here we systematically study rodlike and spherical core-shell silica@Ag particles as more effective alternatives to the dielectric scattering particles. The wavelength-scale silica@Ag particles with sufficiently thin Ag shell support hybrid plasmonic-photonic resonance modes that have low parasitic absorption losses and a broadband optical response. Both of these features lead to their successful deployment in light trapping in high-efficiency DSCs. Optimized rodlike silica@Ag@silica particles improve the power conversion... 

Hematite (α-Fe2O3) is a promising candidate for water oxidation applications due to its abundance in the earth crust and its suitable bandgap. However, hematite performance is severely limited by electron-hole recombination at its interface with the electrolyte; something that can be addressed using electrocatalysts. In this report, we evaluate the influence of a ternary NiFeCo co-catalyst to enhance the water oxidation performance of hematite photoanodes. Thus, NiFeCo co-catalyst is optimized for hematite thin films with i) dense and ii) porous (nano-rod) morphologies. Both hematite films are prepared using electron beam evaporation method followed by an annealing step and NiFeCo... 

Particulate back-reflector films are conventionally used for the improvement of light harvesting in dye solar cells (DSC). The back-reflection of the films is directly related to the scattering efficiency of the individual particles. Inspired by the idea of multilayer optical thin films, here it is demonstrated theoretically and experimentally that putting a SiO2 shell around spherical rutile-TiO2 particles leads to improved light scattering by the particles. These dielectric core-shells not only enhance the overall diffuse reflection of the films, but they also cause a relative improvement in the red and near infrared regions. Back-reflector films of these core-shell particles employed in... 

Iron(III) oxide (hematite, Fe2O3) nanofibers, as visible light-induced photoanode for water oxidation reaction of a water splitting process, were fabricated through electrospinning method followed by calcination treatment. The prepared samples were characterized with scanning electron microscopy, and three-electrode galvanostat/potentiostat for evaluating their photoelectrochemical (PEC) properties. The diameter of the as-spun fibers is about 300nm, and calcinated fibers have diameter less than 110nm with mesoporous structure. Optimized multilayered electrospun α-Fe2O3 nanostructure mats showed photocurrent density of 0.53mA/cm2 under dark and visible illumination conditions at voltage 1.23V... 

Electrochemical exfoliation of graphite has recently attracted a big attention as a simple, fast and scalable method for the preparation of high quality graphene, but there are some drawbacks that hinder its application. Direct deposition is one of the most critical challenges that makes it difficult to deposit uniform, compact and large scale graphene thin films. This work develops a facile electrophoretic deposition route to fabricate exfoliated graphene (EG) film on Ag nanowires (NWs) networks with a controllable film thickness in nanometers scale. EG thin films are deposited with different applied potentials and times from an EG dispersion in N, N-dimethylformamide solvent. Since... 

Large mode area (LMA), single-mode photonic crystal fibres (PCFs) have the potential to provide significant instrumental advantages in fibre stellar interferometry, due to their broad-band attenuation spectrum, endlessly single-moded performance and very large core size. We investigate the theoretical performance of coupling the telescope point spread function directly into LMA PCFs. We find that a single LMA fibre can replace as many as three step-index fibres for atmospheric seeing characterized by D T/r o ≥ 2 with approximately the same coupling performance and a slower feed from the telescope. This could lead to considerable simplification of broad-band fibre interferometers. © 2006 RAS