DFG priority program 1391 "Ultrafast Nanooptics"

The aim of this priority program is to analyze and coherently control the spatiotemporal dynamics of electromagnetic excitations in metallic nanostructures and hybrid nanostructures consisting of metals in contact with organic as well as inorganic optically active materials. In such systems, electromagnetic excitations tend to be highly localized and strongly enhanced. Such field- localization phenomena play a key role in a variety of important applications across the disciplines, including the realization of novel laser structures, the exploitation of optical nonlinearities for ultrasensitive chemical and biological probing, and the development of enhanced single-photon sources for quantum communication.