Nowadays, plasmonics covers a wide scientific field at the frontier between the optics,
the solid state physics and the chemistry with various applications in enhanced spectroscopies, nano-optics, nano-medicine...
The plasmon is defined as the collective oscillation of the electron cloud in a metal and is related with electronic
(excitation of the electrons) and optical properties of a material. It can be optically excited inside a nanoparticle (NP).
The plasmon excitation then induces several processes:
- a large field enhancement around the NP (nano-optics),
- local heating (thermo-plasmonics),
- “hot electrons” creation that can react with molecules (molecular plasmonics).