UC San Diego

My thesis describes the study of nanoscale physics using infrared spectroscopy and nanoscopy methods. The first phase of my research was the development of new methods for tuning metamaterials, which possess custom tailored optical properties not easily found in nature. Working together with Tom Driscoll, I co-invented a simple yet effective method for tuning the magnetic permeability of a Split Ring Resonator based metamaterial. This is the topic of Chapter 1. My subsequent research dealt with near field optics, in particular the application of the infrared imaging method of scattering Scanning Nearfield Optical Microscopy to ultrathin materials such as single layer Graphene and 2nm thin SiO₂ layers on Silicon. On both of these materials we demon- strated incredible sensitivity to ̲< 10 x 10 x 1nm³ volumes (Chapter 3). Thanks to the incredibly large momenta of the evanescent light utilized in sSNOM, we also discovered a rich array of previously unobserved physics in Graphene. In particular, we were able to observe the resonance enhancement of the SiO₂ phonon by the presence of plasmon oscillations in Graphene (Chapter 2). Lastly, a large part of my thesis work also involved building the first cryogenic sSNOM with which we were able to directly image the metal to insulator transition in the correlated oxide: V₂O₃, shown in the last chapter