- Physical Review Journals
All JournalsPhysics Magazine

Physical Review Letters

Reuse & Permissions

It is not necessary to obtain permission to reuse this article or its components as it is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI are maintained. Please note that some figures may have been included with permission from other third parties. It is your responsibility to obtain the proper permission from the rights holder directly for these figures.

Export citation

Export citation

Choose format for download:

Download Citation
  • Open Access

Transition from Near-Field to Extreme Near-Field Radiative Heat Transfer

F. Geesmann, P. Thurau, S. Rodehutskors, T. Ziehm, L. Worbes, S.-A. Biehs*, and A. Kittel†

  • *Contact author: s.age.biehs@uol.de
  • †Contact author: kittel@uol.de
PDF

Phys. Rev. Lett. 135, 166202 – Published 15 October, 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/lcz1-f5v9

Abstract

The radiative heat transfer in the extreme near-field regime, i.e., for distances below 10 nm, remains poorly understood. There are competing experimental results in this regime, with some in good agreement with theoretical predictions, while others report drastically elevated heat fluxes, orders of magnitude larger than what theory suggests. Whether the theory of fluctuational electrodynamics can predict the radiative heat transfer in this extreme near-field regime or not remains a matter of active debate. In this Letter, a radiative heat transfer measurement is presented between a gold-coated sphere and a gold film sample in the transition regime between the near-field and the extreme near-field regime just before contact. The radiative heat flux measurement is made by using a near-field scanning thermal microscope equipped with a temperature sensor at a sharp tip as a heat flux sensor. We find an excellent agreement with the theoretical predictions of fluctuational electrodynamics in the near-field regime. In the extreme near-field regime, however, a highly increased radiative heat flux is observed with values about 100 times larger than the theoretical predictions, indicating that fluctuational electrodynamics fails to capture the radiative heat flux in this regime.

View figure in article

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Article Text

Supplemental Material

References (54)

  1. D. Polder and M. V. Hove, Phys. Rev. B 4, 3303 (1971).
  2. K. Joulain, J.-P. Mulet, F. Marquier, R. Carminati, and J.-J. Greffet, Surf. Sci. Rep. 57, 59 (2005).
  3. A. I. Volokitin and B. N. J. Persson, Rev. Mod. Phys. 79, 1291 (2007).
  4. L. Hu, A. Narayanaswamy, X. Chen, and G. Chen, Appl. Phys. Lett. 92, 133106 (2008).
  5. R. S. Ottens, V. Quetschke, S. Wise, A. A. Alemi, R. Lundock, G. Mueller, D. H. Reitze, D. B. Tanner, and B. F. Whiting, Phys. Rev. Lett. 107, 014301 (2011).
  6. T. Kralik, P. Hanzelka, M. Zobac, V. Musilova, T. Fort, and M. Horak, Phys. Rev. Lett. 109, 224302 (2012).
  7. S. Shen, A. Narayanaswamy, and G. Chen, Nano Lett. 9, 2909 (2009).
  8. A. Narayanaswamy, S. Shen, and G. Chen, Phys. Rev. B 78, 115303 (2008).
  9. E. Rousseau, A. Siria, G. Jourdan, S. Volz, F. Comin, J. Chevrier, and J.-J. Greffet, Nat. Photonics 3, 514 (2009).
  10. S.-A. Biehs, E. Rousseau, and J.-J. Greffet, Phys. Rev. Lett. 105, 234301 (2010).
  11. S. Shen, A. Mavrokefalos, P. Sambegoro, and G. Chen, Appl. Phys. Lett. 100, 233114 (2012).
  12. R. St-Gelais, L. Zhu, S. Fan, and M. Lipson, Nat. Nanotechnol. 11, 515 (2016).
  13. J. I. Watjen, B. Zhao, and Z. M. Zhang, Appl. Phys. Lett. 109, 203112 (2016).
  14. M. P. Bernardi, D. Milovich, and M. Francoeur, Nat. Commun. 7, 12900 (2016).
  15. B. Song, D. Thompson, A. Fiorino, Y. Ganjeh, P. Reddy, and E. Meyhofer, Nat. Nanotechnol. 11, 509 (2016).
  16. F. Menges, M. Dittberner, L. Novotny, D. Passarello, S. S. P. Parkin, M. Spieser, H. Riel, and B. Gotsmann, Appl. Phys. Lett. 108, 171904 (2016).
  17. M. Ghashami, H. Geng, T. Kim, N. Iacopino, S. K. Cho, and K. Park, Phys. Rev. Lett. 120, 175901 (2018).
  18. M. Lim, J. Song, S. S. Lee, and B. J. Lee, Nat. Commun. 9, 4302 (2018).
  19. L. Rincon-Garcia, D. Thompson, R. Mittapally, N. Agrait, E. Meyhofer, and P. Reddy, Phys. Rev. Lett. 129, 145901 (2022).
  20. A. Fiorino, D. Thompson, L. Zhu, B. Song, P. Reddy, and E. Meyhofer, Nano Lett. 18, 3711 (2018).
  21. H. Salihoglu, W. Nam, L. Traverso, M. Segovia, P. K. Venuthurumilli, W. Liu, Y. Wei, W. Li, and X. Xu, Nano Lett. 20, 6091 (2020).
  22. M. Prunnila and J. Meltaus, Phys. Rev. Lett. 105, 125501 (2010).
  23. B. V. Budaev and D. B. Bogy, Appl. Phys. Lett. 99, 053109 (2011).
  24. D. P. Sellan, E. S. Landry, K. Sasihithlu, A. Narayanaswamy, A. J. H. McGaughey, and C. H. Amon, Phys. Rev. B 85, 024118 (2012).
  25. V. Chiloyan, J. Garg, K. Esfarjani, and G. Chen, Nat. Commun. 6, 6755 (2015).
  26. J. B. Pendry, K. Sasihithlu, and R. V. Craster, Phys. Rev. B 94, 075414 (2016).
  27. S. Xiong, K. Yang, Y. A. Kosevich, Y. Chalopin, R. D’Agosta, P. Cortona, and S. Volz, Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 114301 (2014).
  28. I. Altfeder, A. A. Voevodin, and A. K. Roy, Phys. Rev. Lett. 105, 166101 (2010).
  29. K. Kloppstech, N. Könne, S.-A. Biehs, A. W. Rodriguez, L. Worbes, D. Hellmann, and A. Kittel, Nat. Commun. 8, 14475 (2017).
  30. A. I. Volokitin, JETP Lett. 109, 749 (2019).
  31. A. I. Volokitin, J. Phys. Condens. Matter 32, 215001 (2020).
  32. A. I. Volokitin, Phys. Rev. B 103, L041403 (2021).
  33. Z. Geng and I. J. Maasilta, Phys. Rev. Res. 4, 033073 (2022).
  34. Z. Geng and I. J. Maasilta, Commun. Phys. 6, 178 (2023).
  35. A. Alkurdia, C. Adessia, F. Tabatabaeia, S. Lib, K.. Termentzidisc, and S. Merabia, Int. J. Heat Mass Transfer 158, 119963 (2020).
  36. Y. Guo, C. Adessi, M. Cobian, and S. Merabia, Phys. Rev. B 106, 085403 (2022).
  37. X. Li, W. Chen, and G. Nagayama, Nanoscale 15, 8603 (2023).
  38. R. Messina, S.-A. Biehs, T. Ziehm, A. Kittel, and P. Ben-Abdallah, arXiv:1810.02628.
  39. T. Tokunaga, A. Jarzembski, T. Shiga, K. Park, and M. Francoeur, Phys. Rev. B 104, 125404 (2021).
  40. M. G. Viloria, Y. Guo, S. Merabia, P. Ben-Abdallah, and R. Messina, Phys. Rev. B 107, 125414 (2023).
  41. M. G. Viloria, P. Ben-Abdallah, and R. Messina, Phys. Rev. B 108, 195420 (2023).
  42. C. Henkel and P. P. Schmidt, J. Opt. Soc. Am. B 36, C10 (2019).
  43. L. Cui, W. Jeong, V. Fernandez-Hurtado, J. Feist, F. J. Garcia-Vidal, J. C. Cuevas, E. Meyhofer, and P. Reddy, Nat. Commun. 8, 14479 (2017).
  44. A. Jarzembski, T. Tokunaga, J. Crossley, J. Yun, C. Shaskey, R. A. Murdick, I. Park, M. Francoeur, and K. Park, Phys. Rev. B 106, 205418 (2022).
  45. Y. Hanamura, K. Kishimoto, M. Tada, R. Yamada, and H. Tada, Nanoscale 17, 1585 (2025).
  46. L. Worbes, D. Hellmann, and A. Kittel, Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 134302 (2013).
  47. See Supplemental Material at http://link.aps.org/supplemental/10.1103/lcz1-f5v9 contains information about the sample and probe handling procedure, how to load samples and probes into the vacuum system, in-situ cleaning procedure of the samples and probes and the characterization of their cleaning procedure, detection of the effect of water layers on the surface of the sample, recontamination of the surface after several days in the UHV system, and stability of atomically flat gold surfaces.
  48. K. Kloppstech, N. Könne, L. Worbes, D. Hellmann, and A. Kittel, Rev. Sci. Instrum. 86, 114902 (2015).
  49. J. B. Pendry, J. Phys. A 16, 2161 (1983).
  50. N. Mosso, H. Sadeghi, A. Gemma, S. Sangtarash, U. Drechsler, C. Lambert, and B. Gotsmann, Nano Lett. 19, 7614 (2019).
  51. L. Cui, S. Hur, Z. Akbar et al., Nature (London) 572, 628 (2019).
  52. K. Kim, B. Song, V. Fernández-Hurtado, W. Lee, W. Jeong, L. Cui, D. Thompson, J. Feist, M. Reid, F. Garcia-Vidal, J. Quevas, E. Mayhofer, and P. Reddy, Nature (London) 528, 387 (2015).
  53. T. Tokunaga, A. Jarzembski, T. Shiga, K. Park, and M. Francoeur, Phys. Rev. B 104, 125404 (2021).
  54. U. Fleischmann-Wischnath, J. Welker, M. Munzel, and A. Kittel, Rev. Sci. Instrum. 79, 073708 (2008).

Outline

Information

Phys. Rev. Lett. 135, 166202– Published 15 October, 2025
  • Received 12 February 2025
  • Revised 2 June 2025
  • Accepted 19 September 2025
Crossmark - Check for updates button
Creative Commons Logo

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI.

Published by the American Physical Society

Sign In to Your Journals Account

Filter

Filter

Article Lookup

Enter a citation