Fabry-Perot interference pattern scattered by a sub-monolayer array of nanoparticles

Abstract Understanding scattering of visible and infrared photons from nanomaterials and nanostructured materials is increasingly important for imaging, thermal management, and detection, and has implications for other parts of the electromagnetic spectrum (e.g., x-ray scattering and radar). New, interesting reports of photon scattering as a diagnostic probe, from inelastic x-ray scattering and interference to ‘nano-FTIR’ microscopy using infrared photons, have been published and are under active investigation in laboratories around the world. Here, we report, for the first time to our best knowledge, the experimental discovery of a Fabry–Perot interference pattern that is scattered by the sub-monolayer array of plasmonic Ag nanoparticles, and confirm it analytically and with rigorous numerical FDTD simulations.