Fiber Optic Surface Plasmon Resonance Sensor Research Articles

Influence of the core shape on the quality of fiber sensors based on D-shape fiber

Typical optical sensors based on D-shape fibers use standard step-index single-mode fibers (SMF) with a circular core. Multi-mode fibers, fibers with elliptical or rectangular cores, and photonic crystal fibers (PCF) are also used to achieve the best possible sensor performance. However, since the presented sensors differ not only in geometry but, most importantly, in the materials and core sizes, it is difficult to compare their properties directly. In this paper, we numerically analyzed the influence of the shape and size of the core on the sensing performance, with all other relevant parameters being equal. Full Text: PDF References D. Jauregui-Vazquez, J. P. Korterik, C. E. Osornio-Martinez, J. M. Estudillo-Ayala, H. L. Offerhaus, J. A. Alvarez-Chavez, "A strain reflection-based fiber optic sensor using thin core and standard single-mode fibers", Opt. Comm. 522, 128659 (2022). CrossRef H. H. Liu, D. J. Hu, Q. Z. Sun, L. Wei, K. W. Li, C. Liao, B. Li, C. Zhao, X. Dong, Y. Tang, Y. Xiao, G. Keiser, P. Shum, "Specialty optical fibers for advanced sensing applications", Opto-Electron Sci. 2(2), 220025 (2023). CrossRef K. Gasior, T. Martynkien, P. Mergo, W. Urbanczyk, "Fiber-optic surface plasmon resonance sensor based on spectral phase shift interferometric measurements", Sensors and Actuators B: Chemical 257, 602 (2018). CrossRef Y. Ying, G. Si, F. Luan, K. Xu, Y. Qi, H. Li, "Recent research progress of optical fiber sensors based on D-shaped structure", Opt. & Laser Techn. 90, 149 (2017). CrossRef J. Homola, Surface Plasmon Resonance Based Sensors (Berlin, Springer 2006). CrossRef K. Gasior, T. Martynkien., M. Napiorkowski, K. Zolnacz, P. Mergo, W. Urbanczyk, "A surface plasmon resonance sensor based on a single mode D-shape polymer optical fiber", J. Opt. 19, 025001 (2017). CrossRef Q. Wang, W. M. Zhao, "A comprehensive review of lossy mode resonance-based fiber optic sensors", Opt. Lasers in Engineering 100, 47 (2018). CrossRef K. Gasior, T. Martynkien, G. Wojcik, P. Mergo, W. Urbanczyk, "D-shape polymer optical fibres for surface plasmon resonance sensing", Opto-Electron. Rev. 24(4), 209 (2016). CrossRef G. Stepniewski, A. Filipkowski, D. Pysz, J. Warszewski, R. Buczynski, M. Smietana, R. Kasztelanic, "From D-shaped to D-shape optical fiber – A universal solution for sensing and biosensing applications: Drawn D-shape fiber and its sensing applications", Measurement 222, 113642 (2023). CrossRef R. Kasztelanic, H. T. Nguyen, D. Pysz, H. Thienpont, T. Omatsu, R. Buczynski, "Free-Form Optical Fiber with a Square Mode and Top-HatIntensity Distribution", Adv. Science 11, 2402886 (2024). CrossRef J.W. Fleming, "Dispersion in GeO2-SiO2 glasses", Appl. Opt. 23, 4486-4493 (1984). CrossRef T.A. König, P.A. Ledin, J. Kerszulis, M.A. Mahmoud, M.A. El-Sayed, J.R. Reynolds, V.V. Tsukruk., "Electrically Tunable Plasmonic Behavior of Nanocube–Polymer Nanomaterials Induced by a Redox-Active Electrochromic Polymer", ACS Nano 8, 6182-6192 (2014). CrossRef I.Z. Kozma, P. Krok, E. Riedle, "Direct measurement of the group-velocity mismatch and derivation of the refractive-index dispersion for a variety of solvents in the ultraviolet", J. Opt. Soc. Am. B 22, 1479-1485 (2005). CrossRef

[formula omitted] modified U-shaped fiber surface plasmon resonance sensor with high sensitivity

Design of optical fiber structure and sensitive material coating are two effective performance improvement approaches for fiber optic surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensors. Here, a tungsten diselenide (WSe2) modified U-shaped fiber optic SPR sensor is proposed. It is found that the sensing performances of the proposed U-shaped probe can be controlled with the thickness of gold film, WSe2 layers, and bending radius of the U-shaped fiber. A sensitivity of 27520 nm/RIU (RIU: refractive index unit) is obtained with the optimized U-shaped probe, which is about 11.56-fold and 12.29-fold improvements over the traditional in-line transmission fiber optic SPR sensors without WSe2 coating and with monolayer WSe2, respectively. These results demonstrate a promising approach for sensitivity improvement of fiber optic SPR sensors, and the proposed WSe2 modified U-shaped fiber optic SPR sensor may have prospective potential applications in biological sensing, chemical sensing, and environmental monitoring.

Evaluation of reflective fiber-optic surface plasmon resonance sensor for monitoring scale deposition.

A reflective surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor was evaluated for real-time monitoring of scale deposition. The sensor consists of an optical fiber, only 5mm at the gold-coated tip of the sensing area. The effect of silica growth on the sensor response was evaluated using a Na2SiO3 solution. The sensitivity of the sensor to silica was 1.6 ± 0.3nm per one immersion in the solution of 1000mg/L (as SiO2) at 85°Cand subsequnt air drying, as indicated by theSPR peak shift. The amount of silica deposited on the gold surface was measured by the quartz crystal microbalancemethod, and the SPR sensitivity of 0.089nm/ng to silica mass was obtained. The detection limit (3σ) of the SPR sensor was 17ng, correspondingto a thickness of 2.5nm for amorphous silica. The SPR sensor wastested in geothermal brine sampled at the Sumikawa Geothermal Power Plant, where a clear SPR shift was observed, suggesting the effectiveness of the SPR sensor for scale monitoring.

Machine learning approach in multi-channel fiber-optic SPR sensors

Fiber-optic surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensors have been increasingly used due to their advantages such as compact size, stable physical and chemical properties, high sensitivity, and resistant to electromagnetic interference. In this paper, a dual-channel side-polished fiber-optic SPR sensor system is established to detect the refractive index of liquids and the liquid temperature. High sensitivity of ∼2000 nm/RIU (refractive index unit) and linear sensitivity of ∼−2.0 nm/°C is achieved for two-channel SPR sensors, which are integrated for simultaneously RI temperature sensing and easily scaled to multi-channel SPR sensor array. The resonant wavelengths of the two sensors are located in the range of 600–700 nm and 700–800 nm respectively, which could avoid overlapping the resonance dips. Then, we propose an approach using five machine learning algorithms to predict the resonant wavelength of the second channel of SPR temperature sensor using the normalized transmission spectrum data with a wavelength range of 760–889 nm. After error analysis, it is found that the Categorical Boosting (CatBoost) is the best among five algorithms in terms of accuracy and resolution. The results provide clear evidence that accurate SPR resonant wavelength can be obtained with machine learning approach using a more compact spectrometer.

Surface electric field enhanced biosensor based on symmetrical U-tapered HCF structure for gastric carcinoma biomarker trace detection

In this article, a novel U-tapered hollow-core fiber (HCF) surface plasmon resonance (SPR) biosensor coated with PtS2 for early-stage gastric carcinoma (GC) diagnosis was demonstrated. The article proposed the first investigation to detect Interleukin-10 (IL10) and Interleukin-1β (IL1β) which were associated with the risk of developing gastric carcinoma, using optical fiber SPR technology. Herein, the sensitivity of sensor was effectively improved through a combination of tapered and U-shaped structures. Additionally, to further enhance the detection capability, two-dimensional material PtS2 was utilized to increase the surface electric field intensity of the sensor. Simultaneously, optimization of structural parameters such as taper ratio, bending diameters, and Au film thickness was conducted. Ultimately, the designed sensor achieved a remarkable sensitivity of 13210 nm/RIU within the refractive index (RI) range of 1.33–1.37. The sensor demonstrated exceptional performance, achieving sensitivities of 3.64 nm/(ng/ml) and 7.46 nm/(ng/ml) for the detection of IL10 and IL1β biomarkers, respectively, along with limit of detection (LOD) of 2.74 pg/ml and 1.33 pg/ml, and successfully detecting the presence of these biomarkers in the serum of gastric cancer patients. Overall, the proposed sensor exhibits significant potential in early gastric cancer detection and advances the application of optical fiber SPR sensors in trace biodetection.

Optical fiber sensor based on magneto-optical surface plasmon resonance with ultra-high figure of merit

Compared to surface plasmon resonance (SPR), the sensors based on the magneto-optical SPR (MOSPR) technique have much higher figure-of-merit (FOM). However, there are no reports about applying MOSPR in the optical fiber structure now. In this work, a novel D-shaped optical fiber sensor based on the MOSPR technique is proposed. The D-shaped optical fiber is coated with a thin silver film and a magneto-optical (MO) material film of Cerium-doped Yttrium-Iron garnet (CeYIG). By applying a magnetic field on the sensing region, the magneto-optical Kerr effect (MOKE) of the CeYIG layer and the related MOSPR phenomenon could be excited when appropriate light is transmitted in the proposed optical fiber sensor. The influence of the structural parameters including the residual cladding thickness, silver and MO material film thicknesses are analyzed theoretically by the finite element method (FEM). With the optimal parameters, the sensor achieves the sensitivity of 5304 nm RIU−1. Since the peak width of MOSPR spectra is much narrower than that of the SPR spectra, the FOM of the sensor is largely enhanced to 3864 RIU−1 on average and 13260 RIU−1 in maximum, which surpasses the optical fiber SPR sensors vastly. The miniaturized and simple design of the D-shaped optical fiber MOSPR sensor, coupled with the ultra-high FOM, offers itself great potential in biochemical sensing applications.

Hetero-core fiber-optic surface plasmon resonance sensor with ionic liquid gel coating for CO2 sensing

Fiber-optic CO2 sensors are free of electromagnetic interference and highly resistant to corrosion but often require expensive measurement systems or sophisticated preparation procedures. To address this challenge, we developed a CO2 sensor comprising a hetero-core fiber-optic surface plasmon resonance sensor coated with an ionic liquid (IL) gel as a cost-effective CO2 sensing system. Among the various sensors tested, the sensor using ethyl-3-methylimidazolium tetrafluoroborate ([EMIM][BF4]) as the IL, prepared at a pull-up speed of 4.5 mm s−1, showed the best CO2 sensing performance. A hybrid membrane of [EMIM][BF4] and a CO2-absorbing polymer (monoethanolamine) demonstrated higher sensitivity for CO2 concentrations ranging from 0 to 100%. The highlight of the proposed system is its low-cost configuration comprising an 850 nm-wavelength LED and a photodiode as the light source and signal detection device, respectively. Along with facile preparation and low-cost system configuration, the proposed system exhibited significant potential for CO2 sensing in various fields.

Reflective optical fiber SPR sensor with DNA modification for high-sensitive Hg2+ concentration measurement

A reflective optical fiber surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor was proposed to measure the concentration of mercury ions (Hg2+). The specific single-stranded DNA was modified on the optical fiber sensing surface coated with Au film by the combination of covalent bond and charge adsorption. The Hg2+ can mismatch with T-T (thymine-thymine) base pairs in single-stranded DNA to form T-Hg2+-T structure, which led to the change of refractive index in sensing area and the wavelength shift of SPR spectrum. The measurement results showed that when the concentration of Hg2+ increased from 0 μM to 13 μM, the resonance spectrum shifted by 14.26 nm. In the linear range between 1–8 μM, the measurement sensitivity of the sensor could reach 1.51 nm/μM. The limit of detection (LOD) was found to be 0.28 μM. Besides, the sensor showed good stability, selectivity and reusability.

FO-SPR Model for Full-Spectrum Signal Analysis of Back-reflecting FO-SPR Sensors to Monitor MOF Deposition.

In this study, we explore the full-spectrum capabilities of fiber-optic surface plasmon resonance (FO-SPR) for analyzing heterogeneous samples with increased comprehensiveness. Our approach involves refining a literature-derived FO-SPR model to more precisely reflect experimental data obtained using a back-reflecting sensor configuration. Key enhancements in our model include adjustments to the thickness and permittivity of the gold SPR-active layer on the FO-SPR sensor as well as improvements to the angular distribution of light within the system. We apply this optimized model to the investigation of the deposition process of a metal-organic framework (MOF), specifically ZIF-8, using FO-SPR. By closely examining the temporal variations in the FO-SPR signal during MOF layer formation, we simultaneously determine the evolving thickness and refractive index (RI) of the MOF layer, offering a dual-parameter analysis. Our results demonstrate that a full-spectrum analysis of the FO-SPR signal can extract critical information from samples exhibiting radial heterogeneity. This advancement significantly enhances the quantitative assessment of various phenomena that alter the refractive index in the sensor's domain, such as adsorption and binding processes. This work thus represents a significant step forward in the field of FO-SPR sensor technology, promising broad applications in areas requiring the precise detection and analysis of complex samples.

High sensitive optical fiber SPR sensor for label-free detection of Staphylococcus aureus

Optical fiber bacterial sensors have attracted attention in many fields due to their unique advantages. However, it is still difficult to promote its practicality which is mainly subject to their low sensitivity, inferior stability, and reliability. This work reported here an optical fiber surface plasmon resonance (SPR) biosensor enhanced by gold nanoparticles (AuNPs)/Au film coupling for label-free detection the Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus), while both the gold substrates were successfully biofunctionalized with goat anti-human immunoglobulin G (IgG) as the probe to capture and detect the bacteria. In the experiment, the refractive index（RI） sensitivity of the Multimode-Singlemode-Multimode optical fiber (MSMOF) coated with Au film was improved by 19 % after the AuNPs were homogeneously decorated on the Au film surface. To detect S. aureus by the sensor, the SPR wavelength variation in the transmission spectrum was recorded, and its limit of detection (LOD) was demonstrated experimentally to be about 50 CFU/mL and was obtained theoretically to be 1.18 CFU/mL during its concentration range of 50–108 CFU/mL. Also, it shows great linearity in the range of 102-108 CFU/mL and the sensor exhibits excellent specificity and stability. This kind of SPR-enhanced optical fiber biosensor is fully promising for its applications in biomedicine, food safety, pharmaceuticals, etc.

Optical fiber surface plasmon resonance sensor using electroless-plated gold film for thrombin detection.

This paper describes the simple and label-free detection of thrombin using optical fiber surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensors based on gold films prepared by the cost-effective method of electroless plating. The plating conditions for simultaneously obtaining gold film on cylindrical core and end surfaces of anoptical fiber suitable for measurement were optimized. The fabricated sensor exhibited a linear refractive index sensitivity of 2150 nm/RIU and 7.136 (a.u.)/RIU in the refractive index of 1.3329-1.3605 interrogated by resonance wavelength and amplitude methods respectively and a single wavelength monitoring method was proposed to investigate the sensing performance of this sensor. Polyadenine diblock and thiolated thrombin aptamers were immobilized on gold nanoparticles and gold films respectively to implement asandwich optical fiber assay for thrombin. The developed optical fiber SPR sensors were successfully used in the determination of thrombin down to 0.56 nM over a wide range from 2 to 100 nM and showed good selectivity for thrombin, which indicated their potential clinical applications for biomedical samples.

MMF-SMF-MMF optic surface plasmon resonance sensor based on hexagonal plate-like [formula omitted] structure

The manuscript introduces a fiber-optic MSM SPR sensor employing a hexagonal plate-like structure of Co(OH)2/TiO2/Au for surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensing. This article aims to improve it through optimization of material composition and structure. The MSM structure SPR sensors were fabricated on the surface of single-mode fiber optic using chemical precipitation and physical vapor deposition, where Co(OH)2 and TiO2 served as sensitive materials. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed sensor exhibited significantly higher sensitivity and broader application potential than the gold film control group and the gold film/TiO2 control group. Specifically, the gold film control group had a sensitivity of 1778.44 nm/RIU, while the sensitivity of the TiO2/Au control group was 2230.9 nm/RIU. In contrast, the Co(OH)2/TiO2/Au structure SPR sensor had a sensitivity of 3106.5 nm/RIU, which is far superior to the two control groups. Moreover, the results of repeated measurements indicated that the resonant wavelength error was only within 2 nm. These findings suggest that the Co(OH)2/TiO2/Au structure SPR sensor has promising stability and repeatability, making it suitable for applications in various fields, including chemical sensing and biological sensing.

Silver-coated hollow fiber surface plasmon resonance sensor for glucose detection with enhanced limit of detection.

A fiber-optic surface plasmon resonance (SPR) biosensor based on a silver-coated hollow fiber (HF) structure for glucose detection is presented. The sensor surface was immobilized with 4-mercaptophenylboronic acid (PMBA) acting as a glucose recognition monolayer. Then, gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) modified with 2-aminoethanethiol (2-AET) and PMBA were introduced onto the sensor surface after glucose was captured to enhance the wavelength shift of the SPR phenomenon excited by the light transmitted in the wall of the HF sensor. Instead of the conventional one-step sensitization pretreatment commonly used in the deposition process of silver films for fiber-optic SPR sensors, a sensitization-activation two-step activation method was adopted in the fabrication of the proposed sensor. Experiments for glucose detection were performed on the fabricated sensors in the concentration range of 1 nM-1 mM. Results showed that the sensor fabricated by the two-step activation method has a much larger shift of resonance wavelength than the sensor fabricated using the one-step sensitization method. The resonance wavelength shift was found to be linear to the logarithm of the concentration in the range of 1 nM-1 mM. The sensor achieved a limit of detection (LOD) of as low as 1 nM, which is at least an order of magnitude lower than that of other fiber-optic sensors for glucose detection reported previously. The presented HF glucose sensor has the potential for biosensing applications and provides a large reference value in the study of optical fiber SPR sensors for biosensing.

A lipase-conjugated carbon nanotube fiber-optic SPR sensor for sensitive and specific detection of tributyrin.

As a low-density lipoprotein, tributyrin plays an essential role in food safety and human health. In this study, a novel lipase-conjugated carbon nanotube (CNT) surface plasmon resonance (SPR) fiber-optic sensor is used to specifically detect tributyrin for the first time. In this work, CNTs can be used as an amplifying material to significantly increase the sensitivity of SPR sensors due to their high refractive index and large surface area. CNTs can also be used as an enzyme carrier to provide abundant carboxyl groups for the specific binding of lipases. Covering the surface of the sensor with CNTs can not only enhance the performance of the sensor, but also provide sufficient detection sites for subsequent biomass detection, reduce the functionalization steps, and simplify the sensor preparation process. The experimental results demonstrate that the refractive index sensitivity of the traditional multimode fiber (MMF)-single mode fiber (SMF)-MMF transmissive optical fiber sensor is 1705 nm RIU-1. After covering the sensor with CNTs, the sensitivity is 2077 nm RIU-1, and the sensitivity has been improved very well. In addition, there are abundant functional groups on CNTs, which can provide abundant binding sites. Conjugating lipase on carbon nanotubes helps to achieve linear detection in the range of 0.5 mM to 4 mM tributyrin, with a sensitivity of 4.45 nm mM-1 and a detection limit of 0.34 mM, which is below the 2.26 mM detection standard and meets food safety monitoring requirements. Compared with other sensors, the optical fiber biosensor proposed in this study expands the concentration detection range of tributyrin. Furthermore, the sensor also has good stability, anti-interference performance and specificity. Therefore, the sensor proposed in this paper has good application prospects in the fields of food safety and biomedicine.

Advanced Integration of Glutathione-Functionalized Optical Fiber SPR Sensor for Ultra-Sensitive Detection of Lead Ions.

It is crucial to detect Pb2+ accurately and rapidly. This work proposes an ultra-sensitive optical fiber surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor functionalized with glutathione (GSH) for label-free detection of the ultra-low Pb2+ concentration, in which the refractive index (RI) sensitivity of the multimode-singlemode-multimode (MSM) hetero-core fiber is largely enhanced by the gold nanoparticles (AuNPs)/Au film coupling SPR effect. The GSH is modified on the fiber as the sensing probe to capture and identify Pb2+ specifically. Its working principle is that the Pb2+ chemically reacts with deprotonated carboxyl groups in GSH through ligand bonding, resulting in the formation of stable and specific chelates, inducing the variation of the local RI on the sensor surface, which in turn leads to the SPR wavelength shift in the transmission spectrum. Attributing to the AuNPs, both the Au substrates can be fully functionalized with the GSH molecules as the probes, which largely increases the number of active sites for Pb2+ trapping. Combined with the SPR effect, the sensor achieves a sensitivity of 2.32 × 1011 nm/M and a limit of detection (LOD) of 0.43 pM. It also demonstrates exceptional specificity, stability, and reproducibility, making it suitable for various applications in water pollution, biomedicine, and food safety.

High-sensitivity optical fiber SPR sensor with cascaded biconical fiber and hetero-core structure for simultaneous measurement of seawater salinity and temperature

A novel dual-channel optical fiber surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor, which achieves high-sensitivity simultaneous measurement of seawater salinity and temperature, was designed and verified. The hetero-core structure based on no-core fiber (NCF) with 40 nm thick Au film and polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) overlaying was utilized to excite the SPR effect and serve as the temperature sensing channel. In order to effectively separate from the temperature SPR dip, a silver/gold bimetallic film was deposited on the surface of the biconical fiber with a grinding angle of 14° to construct the salinity channel cascaded with the temperature channel, where the metal thickness was determined as Ag/Au: 30 nm/10 nm. The simulation and experimental results showed that the bimetallic film used in this article can significantly improve the figure of merit (FOM) of the sensor compared with the optical fiber SPR sensor deposited with a single kind of metal film. In addition, further experimental results on salinity and temperature indicated that the proposed sensor had a salinity sensitivity of 0.73 nm/‰ and a temperature sensitivity of −2.43 nm/℃, and demonstrated the advantages of ease of manufacturing, acceptable repeatability, and good stability. Therefore, the proposed dual-channel optical fiber SPR sensor has high research value and application prospects in the field of ocean measurement.

MUA/NPAM/ZnO-coated Fiber-Optic surface plasmon resonance sensor for trace Chromium-Ion detection

A transmission fiber-optic surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor based on three-core optical fiber (TCF) coated with mercaptoundecanoic acid (MUA)/ nonionic polyacrylamide (NPAM)/zinc oxide (ZnO) composite film for the detection of chromium ions (Cr3+) in water was proposed and fabricated. Multi-mode fiber (MMF) was spliced with both ends of TCF to form the MMF1-TCF-MMF2 sensing structure. The silver (Ag) film was deposited on the surface of TCF cladding, and then a uniform MUA/NPAM/ZnO composite film was coated on the outer surface of the Ag film to adsorb Cr3+, resulting in the wavelength shift of the SPR resonance peak. After adsorption of Cr3+, the refractive index of the sensing film changed and the resonance wavelength shifted about 62 nm. The detection limit of the sensor is about 0.029 μΜ (1.5 ppb), and the minimum detection concentration of Cr3+ is about 0.2 µM (10 ppb), which is far lower than that of the World Health Organization standard (50 ppb). The sensor shows excellent selectivity, high sensitivity and good stability for the trace Cr3+, and has potential application for monitoring Cr3+ in water.

Fiber-Optic Nanosensors for Chemical Detection

Recently, rapid progress has been achieved in the field of nanomaterial preparation and investigation. Many nanomaterials have been employed in optical chemical sensors and biosensors. This review is focused on fiber-optic nanosensors for chemical sensing based on silica and plastic optical fibers. Four types of fiber-optic chemical nanosensors, namely fiber nanotip sensors, fiber nanoarray sensors, fiber-optic surface plasmon resonance sensors, and fiber-optic nanomaterial-based sensors, are discussed in the paper. The preparation, materials, and sensing characteristics of the selected fiber-optic nanosensors are employed to show the performance of such nanosensors for chemical sensing. Examples of fiber-optic nanobiosensors are also included in the paper to document the broad sensing performance of fiber-optic nanosensors. The employment of fiber-nanotips and nanoarrays for surface-enhanced Raman scattering and nanosensors employing both electrical and optical principles and “Lab-on-fiber” sensors are also included in the paper. The paper deals with fiber-optic nanosensors based on quantum dots, nanotubes, nanorods, and nanosheets of graphene materials, MoS2, and MXenes.

Refractive index SPR sensor with high sensitivity and wide detection range using tapered silica fiber and photopolymer coating.

This paper introduces a surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor using tapered silica fiber and photopolymer coating for enhanced refractive index (RI) detection. Tapering the silica fiber to a diameter of 10 µm ensures the evanescent wave leaks into a 1.8-µm thick photopolymer film, which increases the average waveguide RI and broadens the RI detection range accordingly. A 50-nm thick single-side gold film is coated on the photopolymer film, exciting SPR and causing less light transmission loss than a double-side gold film. The method avoids the complex microfabrication processes of conventional polymer optical fiber SPR sensors, while the waveguide RI can be controlled by altering the curing time of the photopolymer during fabrication. The sensor has an overall sensitivity of 3686.25 nm/RIU, enabling RI detection of 1.333 - 1.493. Moreover, the sensor has an ultrahigh sensitivity of 6422.9 nm/RIU in the RI range of 1.423 - 1.493. The temperature response is about 1.43 nm/°C at 20 - 50 °C, which has little impact on RI detection. Finally, we demonstrate that the sensor can grade the severity of hepatic steatosis by measuring the RIs of cytoplasm/triglyceride emulsions with superior sensing performance.

A L-glutamine binding protein modified MNM structured optical fiber biosensor based on surface plasmon resonance sensing for detection of L-glutamine metabolism in vitro embryo culture

A surface plasmon resonance (SPR) optical fiber sensor with multimode-coreless-multimode (MNM) structure was developed, which modified by L-glutamine-binding protein (QBP) for detection of L-glutamine (Gln). The QBP was immobilized on the surface of gold films by chemical cross-linking and exhibited a binding affinity for L-glutamine. The conformation of QBP can be changed from the “open” to the “closed”, which led to a red-shift of the SPR peak when QBP bounded to L-glutamine. There was a good linear correlation between is a dependence of the SPR peak on and the concentration of L-glutamine concentration in the range 10–100 μM, with a sensitivity of 10.797nm/log10[Gln] for L-glutamine in the in vitro embryo culture (IVC) medium environment, and the limit of detection (LOD) is 1.187 μM. This QBP-modified MNM structure optical fiber SPR sensor provides a new idea for the developmental potential assessment of embryos in the process of in vitro embryo culture.