Dye-assisted visualization of plasmon modes excited in single gold nanoplates

We performed dye-assisted two-photon-excitation imaging of plasmon modes in single gold nanoplates using a scanning near-field optical microscope. We observed that the fluorescence from the dye molecules was excited by the two-photon process and was enhanced several-fold on the nanoplate compared to the bare substrate. Two-photon excitation images of the single nanoplate show unique spatial features that differ from the morphology of the sample. Using electromagnetic simulations, we assigned the observed spatial features to the plasmon mode resonantly excited by the dye fluorescence.