Abstract
We aim to expose the fallacy of claiming that a plasmonic silver film superlens is capable to image real subwavelength objects. This lens was proposed by the Berkeley’s group who, in their misleading experiment, inappropriately regarded subwavelength apertures as the objects to be imaged whereas the main function of these apertures was to transform free space laser light into an evanescent field necessary for exciting the surface plasmon resonance phenomenon in silver. In addition, the apertures also determined the constrained effective area on the silver film where the phenomenon could occur. We provide a fresh insightful physical explanation of how this phenomenon is excited and what it entails. We emphasise the phenomenon’s important effect of subwavelength conversion (reduction) of the generated surface plasmons and their associated bound enhanced evanescent fields.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
References
Christou G, Mias C (2011) Critique of optical negative refraction superlensing. Plasmonics 6(2):307–309
Pendry JB (2011) Metamaterials: transformation optics. New Sci 209:iv–v
Fang N, Lee H, Sun C, Zhang X (2005) Sub-diffraction-limited optical imaging with a silver superlens. Science 308:534–537
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Christou, G., Mias, C. The Chimaerical Quest for the Optical Plasmonic Superlens. Plasmonics 10, 1077–1079 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11468-015-9898-1
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11468-015-9898-1