Enhanced resolution induced by random silver nanoparticles in near-field optical disks

The super-resolution near-field structure (super-RENS) is a high-density near-field optical data storage medium which can achieve superior spatial resolution beyond the diffraction limit. Our previous studies found that enhanced local optical intensity occurred at the near fields of super-RENS disks, and the nonlinear near-field optical enhancement is related to the localized surface plasmons of silver clusters dissociated from the AgOx layer in the super-RENS disks. In this paper, we studied the near-field and far-field properties of AgOx-type super-RENS with different distributions of silver nanoparticles using finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) simulations. Highly localized enhancements are found between adjacent silver nanoparticles in the near fields. The far-field signals of different silver nanoparticles distributions confirm the super-resolution capability of AgOx-type Super-RENS disks, and a simplified Fourier optics model is used to describe the relation between highly localized near-field distributions and enhanced resolution of far-field signals. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.