Thermoplasmonic Tweezers: Probing single-molecules and more
G. V. Pavan Kumar
IISER, Pune, India.
24 November 2021
Online
In this presentation, we will discuss two specific issues: How to perform single-molecule surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) in an optothermal trap? and how to design optothermal fields to trap and interrogate molecules and colloids in a fluid?
In recent years, performing SERS in optical traps has emerged as an important development in nano- and bio-photonics. To this end, tweezer techniques based on surface-plasmons facilitate deeper optical potentials at sub-wavelength scales, and simultaneously provide enhanced electric and optothermal fields. In this
presentation, we will discuss various strategies developed in my laboratory to perform single-molecule SERS in optical and plasmonic tweezer platforms. Specifically, we will highlight some thermoplasmonic effects and directionality aspects of the tweezer platforms in metallic thin film and some plasmonic nano-architectures.
Short bio:
G.V. Pavan Kumar is an associate professor of physics at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Pune, India.
He obtained his PhD from JNCASR, Bangalore. Subsequently he was a postdoctoral fellow at ICFO-Barcelona and Purdue University, before joining IISER in 2010.
His current research interests are optical, optothermal and nanophotonic forces and their utility in probing single molecules and soft-matter systems at micro and nanoscale.
To this end, his lab has been interfacing optical tweezer platforms with a variety of optical spectroscopy and microscopy tools.
He blogs on topics related to science: https://backscattering.wordpress.com/