Microchannel-based plasmonic refractive index sensor for low refractive index detection.

A microchannel incorporated photonic crystal fiber (PCF)-based surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor for detection of low refractive index (RI) at near-infrared wavelength is presented in this paper. To attain a simple and practically feasible mechanism, plasmonic material gold (Au) and sensing medium are placed outside the fiber. A thin layer of TiO2 is employed as an adhesive layer to strongly attach the Au with the silica glass. In the sensing range of 1.22 to 1.37, maximum sensitivities of 51,000 nm/RIU (RI unit) and 1872  RIU-1 are obtained with resolutions of 1.96×10-6 and 9.09×10-6 RIUs using wavelength and amplitude interrogation methods, respectively. To the best of the authors' knowledge, the obtained maximum wavelength sensitivity and resolution are the highest among reported PCF-based SPR sensors to date. The sensor also exhibits a maximum figure of merit of 566. Therefore, the proposed sensor would be an excellent candidate for a wide range of RI detection with higher accuracy for applications such as pharmaceutical inspection and leakage monitoring, bio-sensing, and other low RI analytes.