Two-photon-excited photoluminescence and heating of gold nanorods through absorption of supercontinuum light

Most of lasers used for imaging and heating gold nanorods are single-wavelength lasers and their efficiency to interact with different gold nanorods is limited. In this study, we demonstrated that supercontinuum light could be a fast, effective and energy efficient excitation source for heating of gold nanorods. The photothermal effect and the heating speed of gold nanorods illuminated by a supercontinuum light and femtosecond pulses through two-photon excitation are experimentally studied through using transmission electron microscopy images and photoluminescence images of gold nanorods. It is found that the supercontinuum light improves the heating speed by 39 %, and melts 30 % more of gold nanorods compared with the femtosecond pulse excitation approach. The heating speed of gold nanorods by supercontinuum light depends not only on its polarization states, but also on the pulse width and numerical aperture of its focused beam. It has been found that the supercontinuum is more efficient in heating of gold nanorods, making it potentially valuable for clinical applications.