Charge vs. energy transfer in plasmonic nanoparticles

Because of the high absorption cross-section of plasmonic nanoparticles, they have exciting potential applications as photocatalysts. One barrier to this goal is that it is difficult to overcome the high probability for the energy absorbed to decay into heat. I will discuss recent results that rely on both charge transfer and energy transfer mechanisms to harness the plasmonic excitation to perform desirable chemistry.