Shaping light emission for solid state lighting with plasmon nanoantennas

In this thesis, we investigate the manipulation of light emission for solid state lighting (SSL) using plasmon nanoantennas. State-of-the-art SSL techniques use remote phosphors for white light generation. They have high internal quantum yield, but limited conversion efficiency and high etendue. Plasmon nanoantennas can modify the emission rate, spectra and directivity of remote phosphors and therefore improve their performance. Here we present theoretical and experimental studies on several plasmon nanoantenna systems and discuss their potential applications in SSL. Chapter 2 reports LDOS enhancement measurements on hexagonal arrays of Al nanoantennas. Using a new stochastic localization microscopy method, we map the LDOS with an in-plane resolution of about 40 nm. In Chapter 3, we introduce a new type of plasmon antennas called “dendritic optical antennas” and study their optical response and potential Purcell enhancement. Chapter 4 studies directivity control from a type of aperiodic arrays of plasmon antennas, i. e., Vogel’s golden spirals. We achieve a fluorescence enhancement of factor 2 on a remote phosphor in the direction normal to the surface over a broad spectral band of about 60 nm. Chapter 5 and 6 are about DFB lasers based on Ag nanoantenna lattices. In Chapter 5, we study the spatial intensity distribution in plasmon DFB lasers under the framework of coupled wave theory. In Chapter 6, we introduce two types of plasmon DFB lasers in the forms of checkerboard and random patchworks, and study their potential applications as low etendu, multi-wavelength and speckle-free light sources.