Quantum Medicine With Ultraviolet Aluminum Nanolasers

Nanotechnology has been widely used in biomedical research in the form of plasmonic gold and silver nanoparticles interacting with visible and infrared radiation for biosensing, antimicrobial treatment, and cancer therapy. Recently, aluminum nanoparticles were introduced as a cheaper alternative with a spectral range extending into the ultraviolet region. This provides additional physical mechanisms, which may be used to improve the controllability and effectiveness of biomedical treatment. However, the plasmonic enhancement of aluminum is smaller than that of silver and gold, which may limit applications. We propose and investigate the role of quantum coherence in ultraviolet aluminum nanolasers and discuss their possible experimental implementations. We optimize the drive field in order to enhance the effectiveness of the medical treatment, and show that quantum coherence can improve the performance of aluminum nanoshell lasers to reach similar and higher levels than silver. Our approach may be used for improving the efficiency of ultraviolet-range nano-devices and for facilitating the applications of ultraviolet bactericidal and cancer treatments.