Index Changes In Solutions Research Articles

Long-range surface plasmon Y-junctions for referenced biosensing

Long-range surface plasmon Y-junctions are demonstrated as sensors for the detection of bulk refractive index changes in solution and for protein binding. Using a fully-cladded Au stripe waveguide as a reference channel, common drift and noise in the system can be eliminated, relaxing the need for precise optical alignments. The performance of the structure is discussed theoretically, then bulk sensing is carried out experimentally with five solutions of different refractive indices, and protein sensing is demonstrated through physisorption of bovine serum albumin on a carboxyl-terminated Au stripe. The Y-junction biosensor demonstrated a very good ability to perform drift and noise suppression for fast and accurate biosensing.

Laser-induced pattern formation from homogeneous polyisoprene solutions

This paper reports that the pattern formation in homogeneous solutions of polyisoprene in toluene saturated with C60 induced by a continuous-wave visible laser is observed experimentally. The transmitted beam patterns change with the increase of the laser irradiation time. In the initial phase, the patterns with concentric ring-shaped structure are formed. In the end, the patterns become speckle-shaped. The incubation time of the transmitted beam widening is inversely proportional to the laser power density and solution concentration. The pattern formation results from the optical-field-induced refractive index changes in the solutions, but the mechanism of optical-field-induced refractive index changes in the polymer solutions needs to be further studied.

Application of matrix transformation in numerical modeling of thermal refraction in the transient regime

With the application of matrix transformation, a compact numerical modeling of thermal refraction in transient regime is achieved. By solving photo-acoustic and electromagnetic wave equations with the modeling simultaneously, we simulate the refractive index changes in solutions due to the thermal expansion numerically.