Monitoring of nanoplasmonics-assisted deuterium production in a polymer seeded with resonant Au nanorods using in situ femtosecond laser induced breakdown spectroscopy

In this brief report, we present laser induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) evidence of deuterium (D) production in a 3:1 urethane dimethacrylate (UDMA) and triethylene glycol dimethacrylate (TEGDMA) polymer doped with resonant gold nanorods, induced by intense, 40 fs laser pulses. The in situ recorded LIBS spectra revealed that the D/(2D+H) increased to 4-8% in the polymer samples in selected events. The extent of transmutation was found to linearly increase with the laser pulse energy (intensity) between 2 and 25 mJ (up to 3x10^17 W/cm). The observed effect is attributed only to the field enhancing effects due to excited localized surface plasmons on the gold nanoparticles.