High-quality materials are critical for advances in plasmonics, especially asresearchers now investigate quantum effects at the limit of single surfaceplasmons or exploit ultraviolet- or CMOS-compatible metals such as aluminum orcopper. Unfortunately, due to inexperience with deposition methods, manyplasmonics researchers deposit metals under the wrong conditions, severelylimiting performance unnecessarily. This is then compounded as others followtheir published procedures. In this perspective, we describe simple rulescollected from the surface-science literature that allow high-quality plasmonicfilms of aluminum, copper, gold, and silver to be easily deposited withcommonly available equipment (a thermal evaporator). Recipes are also providedso that films with optimal optical properties can be routinely obtained.
展开▼
