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We have grown arrays of silver nanowires in pores of anodic alumina membranes (metamaterials with hyperbolic dispersion at λ ≥ 615 nm), spin coated them with the dye-doped polymer (HITC:PMMA), and studied the rates of radiative and nonradiative relaxation as well as the concentration quenching (Förster energy transfer to acceptors). The results were compared to those obtained on top of planar Ag films and glass (control samples). The strong spatial inhomogeneity of emission kinetics recorded in different spots across the sample and strong inhibition of the concentration quenching in arrays of Ag nanowires are among the most significant findings of this study.

We report on the optical properties of nanoporous gold leaf (NPGL) metamaterials consisting of single and multiple-fold layers, and having different pore and ligament sizes. Due to their complex structure, such metamaterials have a unique optical property, which distinguishes them from homogeneous gold films. Thus, the transmission spectra of NPGLs feature two characteristic peaks positioned at ~ 490 nm and ~560 nm to 605 nm. The most notable result of this study is that the optical properties of NPGLs can be tuned by changing the dielectric environment and by applying voltage in an electrochemical cell.

Broadband plasmonic absorbers are essential components for photovoltaic, photothermal, and light-emitting devices. They are often made by lithographic processes that impart out-of-plane surface features with subwavelength dimensions to metallic films. However, lithographic subwavelength patterning of inexpensive plasmonic ceramics, such as TiN, is challenging because of high-temperature processing and the chemical robustness of these materials. In this work, we show that layer-by-layer assembly (LbL) of TiN plasmonic nanoparticles with polyelectrolytes results in spontaneous formation of out-of-plane topography with subwavelength dimensions. The columnar morphology of these corrugated coatings and their plasmonic functionality results in broadband absorption capabilities exemplified by 90% of the light from the ultraviolet to infrared parts of the spectrum being absorbed. The method is applicable to large, flexible, and conformal surfaces with complex geometry. It is also fast, scalable, and environmental...

Enhancing electrical conductance in organic semiconductors has been a focus of intense research over last few decades. The improvement can be made by optimizing either the material or the device architecture. As it has been shown in [Orgiu et al., Nature Materials, 2015], strong coupling of organic molecules with a nanostructured plasmonic substrate can significantly improve the molecules’ electrical conductivity. In the present study, we searched for the effect of strong coupling with a Fabry-Perot cavity on the conductivity of the semiconducting Poly (3- hexylthiophene) (P3HT) polymer. Despite the observation of the strong coupling evidenced by a very large Rabi splitting of 1.0 eV, the increase of electrical conductivity with increase of the P3HT film thickness was primarily affected by an increase of the polymer’s order in thick P3HT films.

The objective of this study was to control the transmission, dispersion and, eventually, the nonlinearity of an optical fiber by intercepting and manipulating the evanescent field extending from the core to the cladding with a variety of plasmonic and metamaterial nanostructures. The access to evanescent waves is enabled by placing the core close to the flat surface of the cladding in the so-called D-shaped fiber design. In the first phase of the project, reported here, the numerical simulations of D-shaped fibers with deposited metal (Au) have been performed. We, furthermore, demonstrated that the fiber transmission can be controlled by highly concentrated rhodamine 6G molecules deposited onto the fiber’s flat surface.

We have demonstrated the novel low-threshold surface-emitting plasmonic laser and explained its performance in terms of the distributed feedback mechanism, providing a new degree of freedom to the laser design.

We have demonstrated that the stimulated emission of surface plasmons propagating on top of multilayered hyperbolic metamaterials coated with dye-doped polymeric films has a much lower (2.5–7 times) threshold than that on top of thick Ag films. This observation correlates with more than 2-fold shortening of the spontaneous emission kinetics on top of a lamellar metamaterial as compared to that on top of silver. The propagation of surface plasmons on top of the metamaterial and silver substrates was modeled (in the Otto geometry) using COMSOL Multiphysics. It has been shown that at given system parameters, the plasmon propagation loss in a metamaterial is smaller than that in silver by ∼14% and cannot explain the dramatic reduction of the lasing threshold observed experimentally in the metamaterial samples. We infer that the stimulated emission of propagating plasmons on top of a metamaterial is enhanced by the nonlocal dielectric environment and high local density of photonic states.

A possibility to tune optical properties of materials on demand is of great importance to both fundamental science and applications. We show that nanosecond laser pumping can significantly depopulate the ground state of AF455 dye nanoparticles, resulting in gigantic change of dielectric permittivity of the order of unity. Such extreme nonlinearity (χ(3) = 1.3 × 10–5 esu), evidenced by increase of the Mie scattering efficiency, places AF455 dye among the most efficient χ(3) nonlinear optical materials, extends the limits of active metamaterials and plasmonics, and paves the way to ultimate control of photonic devices and systems.

The functionalities of traditional optical component are mainly based on the phase accumulation through the propagation length, leading to a bulky optical component such as converging lens and waveplate. Metasurfaces composed of planar structures with artificial design have attracted a huge number of interests due to their ability on controlling the electromagnetic phase as well as amplitude at a subwavelength scale. The feasible applications based on metasurfaces include nonlinear dynamics, light beam shaping, quantum interference etc. Beside those promising characteristics, people now intend to discover the field of meta-devices, where we can attain optical properties and functionalities through changing the feature characteristics of metasurfaces in demand. They therefore pave a potential way for the development of flat optical devices and integrated optoelectronic systems and toward the far-reaching applications which are impossible previously. In this talk, four research topics for photonic applications with metasurfaces and meta-devices will be performed and discussed: high efficiency anomalous beam deflector, highly dimensional holographic imaging, versatile polarization control and metadevices with active property.

Due to the weak magnetic responsibility of natural existing materials at optical frequency, optical magnetism remains a “dark state” of light which is largely unexplored. However, optical magnetism is also very desirable because of the many splendid possibilities it may lead to, including ultra-compact opto-magnetic storage devices, high speed magnetic imaging, magnetic tweezers etc. Here we design a Si nano-disk structure as the magnetic nanoprobe which supports magnetic resonance in visible range with the incident azimuthally polarized beam (APB). APB features a donut shape beam profile, with a strong longitudinal magnetic field and a vanishing electric field at the beam axis. Therefore, on the magnetic resonance while the probe is aligned to the APB axis, a longitudinal magnetic dipole is excited in the probe, and interacts with the incident APB inducing an exclusive magnetic force. Making such magnetic nanoprobe under APB illumination serves as an important first step to realize the proposed photoinduced magnetic force microscopy (PIMFM), which selectively exploits the interaction between matter and the magnetic field of light to characterize the optical magnetism in nanoscale. Such investigation of the optical magnetism in samples is dearly needed in many mechanical, chemical, and life-science applications.

Optical nanoantennas possess great potential for controlling the spatial distribution of light in the linear regime as well as for frequency conversion of the incoming light in the nonlinear regime. However, the usually used plasmonic nanostructures are highly restricted by Ohmic losses and heat resistance. Dielectric nanoparticles like silicon and germanium can overcome these constrains [1,2], however second harmonic signal cannot be generated in these materials due to their centrosymmetric nature. GaAs-based III-V semiconductors, with non-centrosymmetric crystallinity, can produce second harmonic generation (SHG) [3]. Unfortunately, generating and studying SHG by AlGaAs nanocrystals in both backward and forward directions is very challenging due to difficulties to fabricate III-V semiconductors on low-refractive index substrate, like glass. Here, for the first time to our knowledge, we designed and fabricated AlGaAs nanoantennas on a glass substrate. This novel design allows the excitation, control and detection of backwards and forwards SHG nonlinear signals. Different complex spatial distribution in the SHG signal, including radial and azimuthal polarization originated from the excitation of electric and magnetic multipoles were observed. We have demonstrated an unprecedented SHG conversion efficiency of 10-4; a breakthrough that can open new opportunities for enhancing the performance of light emission and sensing [4]. References [1] A. S. Shorokhov et al. Nano Letters 16, 4857 (2016). [2] G. Grinblat et al. Nano Letters 16, 4635 (2016). [3] S. Liu et al. Nano Letters 16, 7191 (2016). [4] R. Camacho et al. Nano Lett. 16, 7191 (2016).

Dielectric nanoantennas and metasurfaces have proven to be able to manipulate the wavefront of incoming waves with high transmission efficiency. The important next question is: Can they enable enhanced interaction with the light to transform its colour or to be able to control one light beam with another? Here we show how a dielectric nano-resonator of subwavelength size can enable enhanced light matter interaction for efficient nonlinear frequency conversion. In particular, we show how AlGaAs or silicon nanoantennas can enhance second and third harmonic generation, respectively. Importantly, by controlling the size of the antennas, we can achieve control of directionality and polarisation state of the emission of harmonics. Our results open novel applications in ultra-thin light sources, light switches and modulators, ultra-fast displays, and other nonlinear optical metadevices based on low loss subwavelength dielectric resonant nanoparticles.

The ability to engineer the optical phase at subwavelength dimensions has led to metasurfaces that provide unprecedented control of electromagnetic waves. To reach their ultimate potential, metasurfaces must incorporate reconfigurable functions. The central challenge is achieving large tunability in subwavelength elements. Here, we describe two different approaches for achieving order-unity refractive index shifts: free-carrier refraction and thermo-optic tuning. We experimentally demonstrate wide tuning of single-particle infrared Mie resonances through doping, and demonstrate simulations of electrically reconfigurable III-V heterojunction metasurfaces based on these effects. We conclude with recent experimental demonstrations of dyamic, ultrawide tuning of Mie resonators based on two distinct thermo-optic effects: 1) modifying the electron mass and carrier density in InSb and 2) exploiting the anomalous temperature-dependent bandgap of PbTe.

Many conventional optoelectronic devices consist of thin, stacked films of metals and semiconductors. In this presentation, I will demonstrate how one can improve the performance of such devices by nano-structuring the constituent layers at length scales below the wavelength of light. The resulting metafilms and metasurfaces offer opportunities to dramatically modify the optical transmission, absorption, reflection, and refraction properties of device layers. This is accomplished by encoding the optical response of nanoscale resonant building blocks into the effective properties of the films and surfaces. To illustrate these points, I will show how nanopatterned metal and semiconductor layers may be used to enhance the performance of solar cells, photodetectors, and enable new imaging technologies. I will also demonstrate how the use of active nanoscale building blocks can facilitate the creation of active metafilm devices.

A semiconductor-microcavity is an optical structure composed of two mirrors separated by a layer of semiconducting material. If the energy of the confined photon and excitonic transition are degenerate, interactions can occur in the strong-coupling regime, with the eigenstates of the system being cavity polaritons (a coherent superposition between light and matter). Due to their bosonic nature, cavity polaritons are able to undergo condensation to a macroscopically occupied coherent state. Polariton condensates can be optically pumped and then undergo decay by emitting coherent light, very much like an optically pumped laser. Here, we demonstrate evidence of polariton condensation in a microcavity containing a dispersed molecular dye. Our structures are based on two dielectric-mirrors placed either side of a film of the transparent matrix polymer polystyrene containing the fluorescent molecular dye BODIPY-Br. We first show using CW photoluminescence measurements that weakly-coupled excimer-like states in the BODIPY-Br, together with emission from the (0,1) vibrational transition are responsible for optically pumping polariton states along the lower polariton branch. We then explore the non-linear emission from control thin-films and cavities using pulsed laser excitation. We obtain strong evidence of non-linear photoluminescence with increasing excitation density, associated with a six-fold linewidth narrowing and a continuous blue-shift attributed to polariton interactions with other polaritons and the exciton reservoir. We believe that there is a large number of molecular dyes that could dispersed into a polymer matrix allowing polariton condensation to be realised at wavelengths spanning the entire visible and near infrared.

The main achievement of the modern plasmonics is the concentration of light into nanospots that are much smaller than the wavelength. Nanospot concentration is beneficial for various applications: biomedical imaging and sensing, optical microscopy with single-molecule resolution, heat assisted magnetic recording (HAMR), QED studies, nanolasing, etc. Until now, plasmonic metal nanoantennae, sub-wavelength apertures or metallic near field concentrators (NFCs) are used for this purpose. The main advantage of the metal NFC is their capabilities to localize plasmonic modes, which can be excited by the incident transverse em wave. However, the metal NFCs have large optic loss so we propose a novel all-dielectric NFC, which allows focusing the light into a sub-wavelength hot nanospot, without the dissipative loss. The detrimental dephasing and thermal effects almost vanishes in the dielectric NFC opening new opportunities in the magnetic recording and quantum plasmonics. The ability to concentrate light is important not only to fundamental physics studies, but also to practical device applications. For example, microcavities can force the atoms or quantum dots to emit spontaneous photons in a desired direction or can provide an environment, where dissipative mechanisms such as spontaneous emission are overcome. The electric field is much enhanced in the proposed new device at the vertex of the dielectric beak, which is attached to the tablet dielectric resonator. The resonator in turn is pumped through the plane waveguide. The electric field is enhanced due to longitudinal polarization of the beak vertex, which is excited by em field of the pumped resonator.

High-power femtosecond filaments—laser-light beams capable of kilometer-long propagation—attract interest of nonlinear-optics community due to their numerous applications in remote sensing, lightning protection, virtual antennas, and waveguiding. Specific arrangements of filaments, into waveguides or hyperbolic metamaterials, allow for efficient control and guiding of electromagnetic radiation, radar-beam manipulation, and resolution enhancement. These applications require spatially uniform distribution of densely packed filaments. In order to address this challenge, we investigate the dynamic properties of large rectangular filament arrays propagating in air depending on four parameters: the phase difference between the neighboring beams, the size of the array, separation between the beams, and excitation power. We demonstrate that, as a result of the mutual interaction between the filaments, the arrays where the nearest neighbor beams are out-of-phase are more robust than the arrays with all the beams in phase. Our analysis of the array stability reveals that there exist certain trade-offs between the stability of a single filament and the stability of the entire array. We show that in the design of the experiment, the input parameters have to be chosen in such a way that they ensure a sufficiently high filling fraction, but caution has to be used in order not to compromise the overall array stability. In addition, we show the possibility of filament formation by combining multiple beams with energies below the filamentation threshold. This approach offers additional control over filament formation and allows one to avoid the surface damage of external optics used for filamentation.

We present the novel metamaterial based on a nanoporous alumina membrane impregnated with R6G dye molecules. The splitting of the reflectance and emission bands at large dye concentration is discussed in terms of strong coupling.

We have studied photodegradation of the semiconducting polymer p3ht in the resonant cavity and the control samples. The nearly three-fold reduction of the reaction rate is attributed to the strong polymer-cavity coupling.

A thorough study comparing the performance of more than a hundred photonic and plasmonic lasers concludes that the latter are advantageous when their cavity volumes are close to the diffraction limit.

Enhancing electrical conductance in organic semiconductors has been a focus of intense research over the last few decades. The improvement can be made by optimizing either the material or the device architecture. As it has been shown by Orgiu et al., strong coupling of organic molecules with a nanostructured plasmonic substrate can significantly improve the molecules’ electrical conductivity. We searched for the effect of strong coupling with a Fabry–Perot cavity on the conductivity of the semiconducting poly(3 hexylthiophene-2, 5-diyl) (P3HT) polymer. Despite the observation of the strong coupling evidenced by a very large Rabi splitting of 1.0 eV, the increase of electrical conductivity with increase of the P3HT film thickness was primarily affected by an increase of the polymer’s order in thick P3HT films.

Vanadium oxide (VO2) is known to undergo a semiconductor-to-metal transition at 68°C. Therefore, it can be used as a tunable component of an active metamaterial. The lamellar metamaterial designed and studied in this work is composed of subwavelength VO2 and Au layers and is predicted to have the temperature controlled transition from the hyperbolic phase to the metallic phase. The VO2 films and VO2/Au lamellar metamaterial stacks have been fabricated and studied in the electrical conductivity as well as optical (transmission, reflection) experiments. The temperature depended changes in the absorption and transmission spectra of metamaterials and films have been observed experimentally and compared with the theory predictions.

We demonstrate the strong coupling of SPPs and localized plasmons to dye molecules, characterized by splitting of the dispersion curve. We further observe an anomalous behavior in the emission of molecules strongly coupled to plasmons.

The compensation of loss in metal by gain in interfacing dielectric has been demonstrated in a mixture of aggregated silver nanoparticles and rhodamine 6G dye. An increase of the quality factor of surface plasmon (SP) resonance was evidenced by the sixfold enhancement of Rayleigh scattering. The compensation of plasmonic losses with gain enables a host of new applications for metallic nanostructures, including low- or no-loss negative-index metamaterials. We have also predicted and experimentally observed a suppression of SP resonance in metallic nanoparticles embedded in dielectric host with absorption.

We have studied the influence of the front and the rear mirrors on the emission properties of neodymium random lasers at different thicknesses of the powder layer. Introduction of external mirrors drastically reduces the lasing threshold of the random laser, with the effect of the front mirror being more dominant. External mirrors also influence the location of the stimulated emission region within the powder volume. The experimental results are in a good agreement with the results of the Monte-Carlo simulation.

We study the strong coupling of dye molecules to surface plasmons polaritons of thin silver films. The dispersion splits into three branches and demonstrates avoided crossing, characteristic of strong coupling. The dispersion is further modified, when gain is introduced, by strongly pumping the dye molecules. In a series of complementary experiments, we also show that dye molecules can be strongly coupled to localized plasmons modes of rough silver films and also multilayered hyperbolic metamaterials. Our preliminary results could pave the way for a new class of hybrid plasmonic materials and metamaterials.

We probe effects of field enhancements in silver-dielectric layers using a highly luminescent organic system with Eu3+. Significant enhancement in the excitation spectra is observed at the spectral range corresponding to epsilon-near zero for silver.

We use spontaneous emission of Eu3+ ions as a spectroscopic tool to probe modifications of optical fields in close vicinity of metal and under the conditions of the optically-induced magnetic resonance. We reveal strictly different behavior of electric and magnetic dipole emission in a simple microscope setup, and also discuss the results theoretically.

In the presence of dye molecules, the dispersion curve of SPPs splits into three branches and demonstrates the avoided crossing characteristic of strong coupling. It is further modified by the optical gain in the system.

We show that the stimulated emission of surface plasmon polaritons on top of lamellar metal/dielectric metamaterial has much lower threshold than on top of silver.

Nanoplasmonics — the nanoscale manipulation of surface plasmons (fluctuations in the electron density at a metallic surface) — could revolutionize applications ranging from sensing and biomedicine to imaging and information technology. But first, we need a simple and efficient method for actively generating coherent plasmonic fields. This is in theory possible with the spaser, first proposed in 2003 as a device that generates and amplifies surface plasmons in the same way that a laser generates and amplifies photons. Now Noginov et al. present the first unambiguous experimental demonstration of spasing, using 44-nm diameter nanoparticles with a gold core and dye-doped silica shell. The system generates stimulated emission of surface plasmons in the same way as a laser generates stimulated emission of coherent photons, and has been used to implement the smallest nanolaser reported to date, and the first operating at visible wavelengths. Nanoplasmonics promises to revolutionize applications ranging from sensing and biomedicine to imaging and information technology, but its full development is hindered by the lack of devices that can generate coherent plasmonic fields. In theory, this is possible with a so-called 'spaser' — analogous to a laser — which would generate stimulated emission of surface plasmons. This is now realized experimentally, and should enable many new technological developments. One of the most rapidly growing areas of physics and nanotechnology focuses on plasmonic effects on the nanometre scale, with possible applications ranging from sensing and biomedicine to imaging and information technology1,2. However, the full development of nanoplasmonics is hindered by the lack of devices that can generate coherent plasmonic fields. It has been proposed3 that in the same way as a laser generates stimulated emission of coherent photons, a ‘spaser’ could generate stimulated emission of surface plasmons (oscillations of free electrons in metallic nanostructures) in resonating metallic nanostructures adjacent to a gain medium. But attempts to realize a spaser face the challenge of absorption loss in metal, which is particularly strong at optical frequencies. The suggestion4,5,6 to compensate loss by optical gain in localized and propagating surface plasmons has been implemented recently7,8,9,10 and even allowed the amplification of propagating surface plasmons in open paths11. Still, these experiments and the reported enhancement of the stimulated emission of dye molecules in the presence of metallic nanoparticles12,13,14 lack the feedback mechanism present in a spaser. Here we show that 44-nm-diameter nanoparticles with a gold core and dye-doped silica shell allow us to completely overcome the loss of localized surface plasmons by gain and realize a spaser. And in accord with the notion that only surface plasmon resonances are capable of squeezing optical frequency oscillations into a nanoscopic cavity to enable a true nanolaser15,16,17,18, we show that outcoupling of surface plasmon oscillations to photonic modes at a wavelength of 531 nm makes our system the smallest nanolaser reported to date—and to our knowledge the first operating at visible wavelengths. We anticipate that now it has been realized experimentally, the spaser will advance our fundamental understanding of nanoplasmonics and the development of practical applications.

Many photonic metamaterials and plasmonic devices, in spite of their unparalleled responses to light waves and nearly fantastic applications, suffer from absorption loss in constituent metallic components. Unfortunately, none of the known techniques aimed to conquer the absorption loss has led to a revolutionary technological breakthrough, prompting a continuing quest for efficient solutions to the loss problem. In this letter, we study optical properties of non-metallic organic plasmonic and epsilon-near-zero materials and demonstrate propagation of a surface plasmon polariton at the interface between solid organic dye and air. (C) 2013 AIP Publishing LLC.

We show that roughened surfaces of hyperbolic metamaterials scatter light preferentially inside the media, resulting in a very low reflectance. This phenomenon of fundamental importance, demonstrated experimentally in arrays of silver nanowires grown in alumina membranes, is consistent with a broad-band singularity in the density of photonic states. It paves the road to a variety of applications ranging from the stealth technology to high-efficiency solar cells and photodetectors. (C) 2013 Optical Society of America

Localized surface plasmons (resonant oscillations of free electrons in metallic nanoparticles) and surface plasmon polaritons (surface electromagnetic wave propagating along interface between metals and dielectrics) play an increasing role in a vast variety of applications, including, but not limited to sensing [1], information technology [2], and biomedical testing [3] and treatment [4]. They often determine unparalleled optical properties of metamaterials - engineered composite materials with rationally designed geometry, composition and arrangement of subwavelength building blocks - whose applications range from sub-diffraction imaging [5] and nano-scale lithography [6] to quantum optics [7] and heat management [8].

The stimulated emission threshold of SPPs can be reduced by an order of magnitude if the operation range is changed from visible to near-IR and metamaterial substrates are used instead of silver films.

We demonstrate reduced reflectance and a corresponding enhancement of transmittance in lamellar hyperbolic metamaterials, with scatterers deposited on the top. The effect is much more significant in curvilinear hyperbolic metamaterials. We also show that absorption strengths of dyes on the top of hyperbolic metamaterials can be tuned and enhanced (nearly threefold). The effect can be controlled by interplay of the substrate geometry, composition and location of the absorbing medium. Our observations pave the way for a variety of applications, including broadband enhancements of light trapping and absorption in solar cells.

Spontaneous emission of a dipole can be significantly modified in metamaterials, providing opportunities to engineer emission rates, yields, spectra, and angular patterns. To better understand specifics of such modifications for electric and magnetic emitters, we study luminescence of Eu 3+ ions placed in a close vicinity of arrays of gold nanostrips. The luminescence is strongly polarized, with the preferable polarization parallel to the direction of strips. Polarization patterns and angular distributions of radiation depend on wavelength, and are different for electric and magnetic dipole transitions. The results are discussed in terms of different coupling of emitters with radiative and high-loss modes.

We show that absorption of thin dye-doped polymeric films can be tuned and enhanced ( nearly threefold) by metallic and lamellar metal-dielectric hyperbolic metamaterial substrates. The effect can be controlled by a combination of the substrate's geometry and composition. As the enhancement of absorption is sustained over large range of incidence angles, the demonstrated phenomenon can lead to a variety of important applications, including solar cell technology. (C) 2012 American Institute of Physics. [http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4703931]

As the first step toward parametric amplification of surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs), we demonstrate an efficient (nearly ∼105 more efficient than previously reported) SPP-enhanced second harmonic generation in 2-methyl-4-nitroaniline (MNA) in a Kretschmann geometry.

The behavior of spontaneous emission of emitters embedded inside metamaterials with hyperbolic dispersion has been investigated. A simple technique has been developed to fabricate lamellar metal-dielectric hyperbolic metamaterials on substrates which can be flat, flexible or curvilinear in geometry. Moreover, this method opens up the possibility of functionalizing the dielectric layers by dye molecules. Utilizing this technique, we study the spontaneous emission kinetics of emitters placed either on top, or embedded inside hyperbolic metamaterials. While we observe a reduction in the radiative lifetimes in both cases, owing to the singularity in the density of photonic states, the effect is much stronger when the dye molecules are inside the metamaterial, rather than on its surface.

We study surface-plasmon-assisted stimulated emission of Rhodmine 6G and Rhodamine B laser dyes and find a striking difference of the stimulated emission behavior on smooth and corrugated silver surfaces.

Using the broadband “super-singularity” in the density of states of (meta) materials with hyperbolic dispersion, we demonstrate, both theoretically and experimentally, a new concept of radiation-absorbing systems.

We show that metal-free materials with negative real parts of the electric permittivity can be realized experimentally and their dielectric functions can be controlled by laser illumination.

In the metamaterial with hyperbolic dispersion (an array of silver nanowires in alumina membrane) we have observed six-fold reduction of the emission life-time of dye deposited onto the metamaterials surface. This serves as the evidence of the earlier predicted high density of photonic states in hyperbolic metamaterials., 3 pages, 1 figures