Transmission-type SPR sensor based on coupling of surface plasmons to radiation modes using a dielectric grating

Abstract

A transmission-type surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor is presented. In the transmission-type SPR structure, surface plasmon waves are outcoupled to radiation modes by the use of dielectric grating on a thin-film layer of Ag. Compared with the traditional reflection-type SPR sensor, the new method provides larger detectable range, which might be useful to investigate thick targets such as in cell analysis. Theoretical simulations show that the structures provide high transmission efficiency for surface plasmon resonance and the devices present extremely linear sensing characteristics. Furthermore, it is found that the transmission efficiency and the refractive index detection sensitivity of the SPR sensor can be improved by the use of a lower refractive index glass prism.

Keywords

surface plasmon resonance (SPR) / optical sensors / glass prism / rigorous coupled wave analysis

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Pre-Research Special Project in Important Fundamental Research of China (Grant No. 2005CCA04200).

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2014 Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg