Electromagnetic response of nanoparticles with a metallic core and a semiconductor shell

We study the interplay between localized surface plasmon resonances from metallic cores and electromagnetic resonances from semiconducting shells in core@shell nanoparticles in the optical and near-infrared regions. To this end, we consider silver (Ag) spheres as plasmonically active nanoparticles with radii 20 nm, covered with shells of silicon (Si) up to 160 nm in thickness. We use the classical Lorenz-Mie theory to calculate the response of the core@shell nanoparticles to an external electromagnetic field that reveals a high degree of tunability of the Ag surface plasmons with a varying Si shell thickness, and a consequent merging of their Mie resonances. In contrast with pure metallic systems, the use of a low-bandgap semiconducting shell allows for a unique interrelation between its strong characteristic magnetic dipole mode and the localized surface plasmon resonance of the metallic core. This allows control over the forward and backward scattering efficiencies in the near-infrared in accordance with the predictions based on the Kerker conditions. Employing several other core@shell materials (Al@Si, Au@Si and Ag@Ge), we show that this approach to tailoring the absorption and scattering efficiencies, based on Kerker’s conditions, can be further generalized to other similar core@shell systems.