Optical properties of silver microcrystals prepared by means of the gas aggregation technique

doi:10.1016/0301-0104(80)80024-3

Chemical Physics

Volume 47, Issue 1, 15 March 1980, Pages 95-104

https://doi.org/10.1016/0301-0104(80)80024-3 Get rights and content

Abstract

Spherical silver microcrystallites with mean diameters between 10 and 200 Å have been prepared by gas aggregation techniques using argon gas in a dynamic flow system. The crystallites were isolated in a growing argon matrix at 4 K. Typically, a metal volume fraction below 0.1% was used, which was low enough to prevent coagulation into large aggregates and to supress substantially the role of dipole—dipole coupling. In each experiment a small quantity of these crystallites was allowed to condense onto an umorphous carbon foil, which allowed a direct characterisation of the size distribution by evaluating the corresponding electron micrographs. The optical absorption spectra exhibit mainly the commonly observed band due to surface plasma resonance oscillations. The peak position of this band shifts from 3800–3600 Å as the mean microcrystallite diameter decreases from 100 Å to 10 Å. The frequently reported increase of the halfwidth from 0.2 eV to 1 eV or more with decreasing crystallite size could not be confirmed. Rather, a much smaller increase of the halfwidth from 0.1 eV to 0.16 eV was measured.

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Optical properties of silver microcrystals prepared by means of the gas aggregation technique

Abstract

J. Phys. Soc. Japan

Solid State Commun.

Z. Phys.

Phys. Rev.

Phil. Trans.

Phil. Trans.

Ann. Physik

Physica

J. Phys. Soc. Japan

Solid State Commun.

Z. Phys.

J. Chem. Phys.

Z. Phys.

J. Phys.

Z. Phys.

Z. Phys.

Phys. State. Sol. (b)