On-chip biochemical sensor using wide Gaussian beams in silicon waveguide-integrated plasmonic crystal.

Abstract

An on-chip biochemical sensor based on two-dimensional waveguide-integrated plasmonic crystal formed by a nanogap tile (NGT) array is realized. By using on-chip optical lenses, an ultra-wide collimated Gaussian beam is launched, coupled with surface plasmonic crystals and collected with relatively low additional insertion loss, allowing a large sensing area. The optical field enhancement and stop-band shift of the NGT device for biochemical sensing are numerically and experimentally demonstrated with sensitivity reaching up to ${\sim}{260}\;{\rm nm/RIU}$∼260nm/RIU. Our sensor is demonstrated with monolayer thiol molecules illustrating that it can be functionalized with this class of molecule which is commonly used with bulk surface plasmon resonance sensors.