Enhanced near-field radiative heat transfer between nanostructure emitter and GaSb absorber by surface plasmon polaritons and hyperbolic modes

Abstract

Near-field radiative heat transfer (NFRHT) can overcome the blackbody radiation limit and holds great promise in radiative energy conversion devices such as near-field thermophotovoltaics (NF-TPV). However, NF-TPV is not yet ready for practical applications at larger scales due to the challenges of maintaining the nanoscale gap and the lack of optimized NFRHT with nanostructure emitters. Here, we measure the enhanced near-field radiative heat flux between GaSb absorbers and nanostructure emitters that can be applied in NF-TPV systems, with a cm2-scale plate–plate structure and a temperature difference of 100 K at a gap down to 200 nm. It is demonstrated that the radiative heat flux between the bulk W emitter and the absorber at a 400 nm gap is about an order of magnitude larger than that in the far field, and the heat flux can be further enhanced by 1.6 times at a 200 nm gap. Moreover, the enhanced NFRHT from the surface plasmon polaritons supported by a indium tin oxide film and the hyperbolic modes supported by a W/SiO2 multilayer is also experimentally verified and theoretically analyzed.