Theoretical Development of Polymer-Based Integrated Lossy-Mode Resonance Sensor for Photonic Integrated Circuits

Abstract

A promising phenomenon such as lossy-mode resonance (LMR) is of great interest in sensor applications. Until now, this phenomenon has been shown only in fibers or planar waveguides; however, given the rapid development of such an important technological area as photonic integrated circuits (PICs), it is important to transfer LMR technology specifically to PICs. In this article, we propose the theoretical development of an integrated polymer-based LMR sensor that will also contribute to the development of hybrid organic–inorganic PICs. This work theoretically shows that LMR can be achieved using polymer SU-8 waveguides on a glass substrate, on top of which TiO2 is deposited. In addition, the paper shows that multiple resonances can be achieved in the developed integrated sensor. The highest sensor sensitivity (about 1400 nm/RIU) was achieved with 40 nm of TiO2. The effect of the waveguide and coating geometries, as well as the polarizations of propagating modes, is studied in this paper.