Supported Lipid Bilayers as Stochastic Conveyor Belt for Delivery to the Near Field of Nanoscopic Structures

Abstract

Placement of nanoscopic entities in the optical near field of a structure such as a plasmonic nanoantenna or the aperture of a scanning near-field optical microscopy (SNOM) remains a nontrivial task, which often requires sophisticated nanofabrication techniques. Here, we show that the fluidity and diffusion of lipid molecules in bilayer geometries can be exploited for facile delivery of nano-objects such as organic dye molecules, semiconductor quantum dots, and gold nanoparticles to the near field of well-defined surface structures. We demonstrate this in three different scenarios with substantial plasmonic enhancement of fluorescence.