ABSTRACT
Colloidal plasmonic nanoparticles (NPs) have attracted a great deal of research attention in many fields, ranging from biosensors to photonic materials. This chapter reviews the standard assembly methods to obtain colloidal nanomaterials in suspension or solid form. It presents an overview of different one-dimensional, two-dimensional, and three-dimensional plasmonic nano-structures that have been constructed. One of the primary ways to form assemblies of plasmonic NPs is via a simple evaporation of a dispersion of NPs on a surface. Plasmonic assemblies, with feature sizes comparable to the particle dimensions, were realized by nanoxerography, e-beam lithography, or employing microphase-separated block copolymer films as substrates. The use of electric fields for plasmonic particle assembly takes advantage of the high dielectric constant of metallic particles relative to plastics and silicates, enabling stronger field gradients to direct such particles of nanometer dimensions. The colloidal control over self-assembly can be realized by tuning surface chemistry of NPs and the properties of the solvent.
