Nanophotonics for Chemical Imaging and Spectroscopy
The manipulation of light and light-matter interactions on the nanoscale is enabled by the unique optical properties of plasmonic metal nanostructures and nanoparticles. Indeed, engineered hybrid molecular-plasmonic nanostructures have enabled single molecule detection and identification via surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS). Further, the same effect is at the core of visualizing single molecules with sub-nanometer spatial resolution via tip-enhanced Raman scattering (TERS). More generally, modern applications of plasmon-enhanced spectroscopy and microscopy fueled advances in fields as diverse as quantum and semiconductor materials, heterogeneous catalysis, and the health sciences, to name a few. All these exciting developments and many more are touched in this virtual special issue (VSI) on nanophotonics. From ultra-precise chemical imaging measurements performed in a scanning tunneling microscope chamber to single molecule spectroscopic measurements performed at solid-air and solid-liquid interfaces, this VSI includes contributions from active practitioners that are all striving to better-understand increasingly complex interfaces encountered in the biological, materials, and chemical sciences.