Near field enhancement in silver nanoantenna-superlens systems

We demonstrate near field enhancement generation in silver nanoantenna-superlens systems via numerical modeling. Using near-field interference and global optimization algorithms, we can design nanoantenna-superlens systems with mismatched permittivities, whose performance can match those with matched permittivities. The systems studied here may find broad applications in the fields of sensing, such as field-enhanced fluorescence and surface-enhanced Raman scattering, and the methodology used here can be applied to the designing and optimization of other devices, such as two-dimensional near field focusing lens. (C) 2012 American Institute of Physics. [http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4732793]