Wavelength multiplexing and tuning in nano-Ag/dielectric multilayers

Multicolored optical active planes have been fabricated with magnetron sputter method coupled with selective masking technique. The plane is multilayer structured with Ag nanoparticles and TiO(2) thin layer as the building blocks. It was found that the formed multilayer can be readily wavelength multiplexed by simply overlapping several nano-Ag/TiO(2) layered structures, each of which may have different surface plasmon resonance wavelength. Unlike high order multiple resonances of large particles each of the multiplexing wavelengths in such a system is separately tunable. Importantly, it reveals that modification of the TiO(2) layer thickness generates a fine tuning of the resonance wavelength.