Nanoparticle meta-grid for enhanced light extraction from light-emitting devices
A tailored layer of plasmonic nanoparticles can be introduced into the epoxy casing of a light-emitting diode (LED) to improve the device's light output, to benefit energy savings and boost the LED lifetime. In a new report on Nature Light: Science & Applications, Debrata Sikdar and a team of scientists in chemistry, electronics and physics at the Imperial College London and the Indian Institute of Technology, showed the benefits of including a two-dimensional (2-D) array of silver nanoparticles known as a 'meta-grid' to the lens shaped epoxy packaging. They tested their theory using computer simulations and demonstrated the ability to improve light extraction from the nanoparticle meta-grid based LED. The alternative approach can be customized to suit a specific color of emission, the authors proposed a few additional schemes to implement the strategy into the existing LED manufacturing technology.