Fig. 5. Thermal modulation of metal plasmons.

a, b Variation in the probed reflection spectra in a gold ribbon array (see inset in b) under different pump fluences at 785 nm wavelength; the gold thickness is 1 nm in a and 10 nm in b. c Fluence dependence of the electron temperature of extended gold and silver films of different thicknesses immediately after optical pumping. d Peak reflectance as a function of the pump fluence for different metal types and thicknesses, normalized to the value at zero fluence with geometrical parameters as indicated by labels. The ribbon array is placed on an ε = 2 dielectric substate in all cases