Energy-Saving Meta-Glasses with Embedded Plasmonic Nanoparticles

Plasmons are collective charge carrier excitations. Using different plasmonic materials to fabricate nanocrystals and controlling their size and geometry allows us to obtain sharp resonances from UV to near IR. By embedding ensembles of nanocrystals in dielectric materials, we can design metamaterials with specific transmission profiles that filter out a broad spectrum while remaining transparent to selected frequency bands.¹ We discuss this idea in the specific context of its application in energy-saving windows.² By blocking UV and IR radiation from the solar spectrum they reduce the energy expenditure of active cooling systems in warm climates, but they retain the desirable property of being transparent to visible light. In this talk we will present theoretical results for plasmonic glasses created with different nanoparticle geometries³ and materials, offering alternatives to current industrial fabrication standards, with comparable efficiencies and potentially lower costs.

[1] L.V. Besteiro, K. Gungor, H.V. Demir, A.O. Govorov, J. Phys. Chem. C 121, 2987–2997 (2017).
[2] L.V. Besteiro, X.-T. Kong, Z. Wang, F. Rosei, A.O. Govorov, Nano Lett. 18, 3147-3156 (2018).
[3] Y. Qin, X.-T. Kong, Z. Wang, A.O. Govorov, U.R. Kortshagen, ACS Photonics 4, 2881-2890 (2017).