Comparison between one layer and bilayer surface plasmon resonance optical fiber chemical sensor

Abstract

Surface Plasmon Resonance (SPR) - based plastic optical fiber has been provided as a sensor to estimate the refractive index and then the concentration of specific chemical samples. Two configurations were suggested for the design. The first was through using a single layer of gold with a thickness of about 40nm deposited on a 10mm portion in the middle of plastic optical fiber. In the second configuration, a bilayer is deposited on the fiber. This bilayer consisted of a gold layer with a thickness of about 30 nm and an aluminum layer with a thickness of about 30 nm. Both of these configurations are utilized as chemical sensors. The resonance wavelength for the bilayer-based sensor was higher than that of the single-layer sensor for all studied chemical samples. The highest resonance wavelength was for the salt-water solution with a concentration of 30%. For the salt-water solution with a concentration of 30%, the resonance wavelength with the bilayer-based sensor was 568nm while it was 540nm with the single-layer sensor.

Keywords

• surface Plasmon resonance
• plastic optical fiber
• chemical sensor