Plasmon-Mediated Energy Transfer between Two Systems out of Equilibrium

The fabrication of nanostructured samples assembling organic, inorganic emitters, and plasmons has been widely explored in the last decades in the context of energy-harvesting applications or for the design of optoelectronic devices. However, understanding the interaction between each component in such a complex scenario is a challenge. Here we report on the energy transfer between ensembles of inorganic quantum dots and organic J-aggregates mediated by surface plasmon polaritons. The two emitters' species are spatially separated on the surface of a continuous silver film in an optically structured sample in order to measure the impact of their relative separation on the energy transfer. We introduce a theoretical model of the photoluminescence of the system to quantify the energy transfer between the two species through the chemical potential of photons.