Plasmon-driven nanowire actuators for on-chip manipulation

Shuangyi Linghu, Zhaoqi Gu, Jinsheng Lu, Wei Fang, Zongyin Yang, Huakang Yu, Zhiyuan Li, Runlin Zhu, Jian Peng, Qiwen Zhan, Songlin Zhuang, Min Gu (+1 others)
2021 Nature Communications  
AbstractChemically synthesized metal nanowires are promising building blocks for next-generation photonic integrated circuits, but technological implementation in monolithic integration will be severely hampered by the lack of controllable and precise manipulation approaches, due to the strong adhesion of nanowires to substrates in non-liquid environments. Here, we demonstrate this obstacle can be removed by our proposed earthworm-like peristaltic crawling motion mechanism, based on the
more » ... tic expansion, friction, and contraction in plasmon-driven metal nanowires in non-liquid environments. The evanescently excited surface plasmon greatly enhances the heating effect in metal nanowires, thereby generating surface acoustic waves to drive the nanowires crawling along silica microfibres. Advantages include sub-nanometer positioning accuracy, low actuation power, and self-parallel parking. We further demonstrate on-chip manipulations including transporting, positioning, orientation, and sorting, with on-situ operation, high selectivity, and great versatility. Our work paves the way to realize full co-integration of various functionalized photonic components on single chips.
doi:10.1038/s41467-020-20683-2 pmid:33452266 fatcat:ylwsdfv4d5dkji5btgwkjm6y6m