Plasmon enhancement of fluorescence in single light-harvesting complexes from amphidinium carterae

Abstract

We show that single peridinin-chlorophyll a-protein light-harvesting complexes from dinoflagellate Amphidinium carterae placed near to silver nanoparticles show strongly enhanced fluorescence emission. Single molecule spectroscopy experiments performed at room temperature point toward an enhancement of more than an order of magnitude for optimal conditions. Irrespective of the enhancement, we observe no effect of the metal nanoparticle on the fluorescence emission energy of the complex. This result provides a way to control the optical properties of biomolecules via plasmon excitations in metal nanoparticles.