A multi-channel fiber SPR sensor based on TDM technology

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Abstract

Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor has been widely used in biochemical reaction detection. With the development of SPR sensing, multi-channel SPR sensors have attracted attention owing to their potential application in multi-analyte detection. For fiber-based SPR sensor, due to the small size of the fiber core, it is hard to realize the multi-channel fiber SPR sensor based on the time division multiplexing (TDM) technology. Here we propose and demonstrate a multi-channel fiber SPR sensor based on the TDM technology by using the multi-core fiber. The multiple cores are multiple sensing zones, which equals to subdividing the traditional single fiber core into multiple independent sensing zones, realizing the multi-channel SPR sensing. This multi-channel SPR sensor has some advantages: it can realize multi-analyte detection simultaneously; it can compensate the ambient temperature variation, nonspecific binding and physical absorption and others; it can adjust working resonance wavelength shift range by adjusting the fiber grinding angle; it can work without resonance wavelength shift range overlapping by switching independent sensing channels. Besides that, we can add a sensing zone on the receiving fiber to construct the wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) sensing for each fiber core channel. By combining TDM and WDM technology, we can double the sensing channels.

Introduction

Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) is a popular surface analysis method used to detect changes in the refractive index or thickness of an adsorbed layer on or near a SPR-active surface with high sensitivity [1], [2], [3], [4]. With the development of SPR sensing, multi-channel SPR sensors have attracted attention owing to their potential applications in multi-analyte detection [5], [6].

According to Jiří Homola [7], [8], [9], for the prism-based SPR sensors with wavelength modulation, the time division multiplexing (TDM) technology and wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) technology are two common methods to realize the multi-channel distributed SPR sensing. The TDM technology employs spectral analysis of multiple light beams performed by multiple spectrographs [10], or uses an optical switch routing light from multiple channels at single spectrograph [11]. The WDM technology combines pairs of sensing channels with multiple parallel light beams to provide multiple sensing channels [7].

Currently, the majority of fiber-based SPR sensors realize the multi-channel sensing by employing the WDM technology [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], [17]. However the complex fabricating processing and low testing sensitivity prevent the development of this kind of sensors. Actually, compared with the WDM technology, the TDM technology is a simple and practical method to realize the multi-channel sensing. Owning to the optical path switching working function, the TDM type sensor can work without resonance wavelength shift range overlapping. They have developed many SPR sensors based on the TDM technology [5], [8], [9]. However, these sensors are prism-based. It is hard for fiber-based SPR sensor to employ the TDM technology. The reason is that, the size of the fiber core is too small, it is too hard to subdivide the fiber core into multiple independent sensing zones to realize the TDM sensing.

In order to solve this problem, by using the micro-structured multi-core fiber, we propose and demonstrate a novel fiber-based SPR sensor, which employs the TDM technology to realize the multi-channel SPR sensing. In this sensor, the multiple cores are multiple sensing channels, which is equivalent to subdividing the fiber core into multi sensing zones, realizing the multi-channel distributed SPR sensing. This multi-channel SPR sensor has some advantages: it can realize multi-analyte detection simultaneously; it can compensate and reference-measure the interferences caused by the temperature variation, nonspecific binding and physical absorption and others; it can adjust resonance wavelength shift range of the sensor by adjusting the fiber grinding angle; it can work without resonance wavelength shift range overlapping by switching independent sensing channels while keeping high testing sensitivity. Besides that, we can add a sensing zone on the receiving fiber to realize the wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) sensing for each fiber core channel. By combining TDM and WDM technology, we can double the sensing channels. This distributed fiber sensor has important significance in the fields of multi-channel liquid refractive index and temperature self-reference measurements.

Section snippets

Fiber probe

In order to realize the TDM technology in the distributed fiber-based SPR sensor, we employ the micro-structured multi-core fiber, which means we integrate multiple sensing channels into a single fiber to realize TDM distributed sensing. Here, taking the twin-core fiber as the example, we show the fiber probe designing and fabricating method.

Fig. 1 provides the configuring of the multi-channel distributed fiber-based SPR sensor. According to the ref [18], different fiber grinding angles produce

Results

Fig. 5(a) and (b) show the experimental results of the channels I and II with the fiber grinding angles of 13° and 17°, respectively. Fig. 5(c) shows the relation between the refractive index and the resonance wavelength of two channels. Here the experimental curve of the channel II with the refractive index of 1.385 cannot be recorded because that the testing scope of our optical spectrum analyzer is 0–1000 nm (the resonance wavelength with the refractive index of 1.385 is 1227 nm (see Fig. 3

Conclusion

Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor has been widely used in biochemical reaction detection. With the development of SPR sensing, multi-channel SPR sensors have attracted attention owing to their potential uses in multi-analyte detection, compensation and reference-measurement of the interferences caused by the temperature variation, nonspecific binding, physical absorption, and others. For fiber-based SPR sensors, due to the small size of the fiber core, which prevents the sensing area

Acknowledgments

This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants no. 11204047, 61227013, 61275087, 6120571 and 61377085), and partially supported by the following grants: the 111 project (B13015), Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Education of China (Grants no. 20112304, 20110017), Postdoctoral Science Foundation Fund of China (Grants no. 2015T80322, 2014M550181, 2014M551217), and Fundamental Research Funds for Harbin Engineering University of China.

Zhihai Liu received the B.S. degree in optoelectronics, the M.S. degree in optical engineering, and the Ph.D. degree in photonics from Harbin Engineering University, Harbin, China, in 1999, 2003, and 2006, respectively. He is currently with the Key Lab of In-fiber Integrated Optics, Ministry Education of China, Harbin Engineering University. His research interests include fiber optic trapping and its applications. He is the author or coauthor of more than 30 papers published in various

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Zhihai Liu received the B.S. degree in optoelectronics, the M.S. degree in optical engineering, and the Ph.D. degree in photonics from Harbin Engineering University, Harbin, China, in 1999, 2003, and 2006, respectively. He is currently with the Key Lab of In-fiber Integrated Optics, Ministry Education of China, Harbin Engineering University. His research interests include fiber optic trapping and its applications. He is the author or coauthor of more than 30 papers published in various international journals.

Yong Wei received the B.S. degree in physics and the M.S. degrees in optical engineering from Harbin Engineering University, Harbin, China, in 2010 and 2013, respectively. He is currently pursuing the Ph.D. degree with the Photonics Research Center, College of Science, Harbin Engineering University. His research interests include waveguide theory and optical fiber trapping.

Yu Zhang received the B.S. degree in physics education, the M.S. degree in biophysics from Northeast Normal University, and the Ph.D. degree in photonics from Harbin Engineering University, Harbin, China, in 2003, 2006, and 2012, respectively. She is currently with the Key Lab of In-fiber Integrated Optics, Ministry Education of China, Harbin Engineering University. Her research interests include fiber optic trapping and its applications. She is the author or coauthor of more than 10 papers published in various international journals.

Yushan Wang received the B.S. degree in electronic information science and technology (photoelectric information engineering) from Harbin Normal University, Harbin, China, in 2015. She is currently pursuing the Master degree with the College of Science, Harbin Engineering University. Her research interests include waveguide theory and optical fiber trapping.

Yaxun Zhang received the B.S. degree in physics and the M.S. degrees in optical engineering from Harbin Engineering University, Harbin, China, in 2009 and 2012, respectively. He is currently pursuing the Ph.D. degree with the Photonics Research Center, College of Science, Harbin Engineering University. His research interests include waveguide theory and optical fiber trapping.

Enming Zhao received the M.S. degree in physics electronics from Heilongjiang University in 2005, and the Ph.D. degree in optics engineering from Harbin Engineering University, Harbin, China in 2013. He is currently with the Key Lab of In-fiber Integrated Optics, Ministry Education of China, Harbin Engineering University. Her research interests include fiber optic trapping and its applications. He is the author or coauthor of more than 10 papers published in various international journals.

Jun Yang received the B.S. degree in optoelectronics, the M.S. degree in optical engineering, and the Ph.D. degree in photonics from Harbin Engineering University, Harbin, China, in 1999, 2002, and 2005, respectively. He is currently a Professor in the Key Lab of In-fiber Integrated Optics, Ministry Education of China, Harbin Engineering University. His research interests include fiber optic sensors and optic interferometers. He is the author or coauthor of more than 60 papers published in various international journals.

Chunyu Liu received the B.S. degree in optoelectronics, the M.S. degree in microelectronics and solid state electronics, and the Ph.D. degree in microelectronics and solid state electronics from Heilongjiang University, Harbin, China, in 1998, 2001, and 2011, respectively. She is currently with Key lab of Electronic Engineering College of Heilongjiang Province, Heilongjiang University. Her research interests include fiber optic passive devices and fiber sensor. She is the author or coauthor of more than 20 papers published in various international and domestic journals.

Libo Yuan received the B.S. degree in physics from Heilongjiang University, Harbin, China, in 1984, the M. Eng. degree in communication and electronic system from Harbin Shipbuilding Engineering Institute, Harbin, in 1990, and the Ph.D. degree in photonics from The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Kowloon, Hong Kong, in 2003. He is currently a Professor in the Key Lab of In-fiber Integrated Optics, Ministry Education of China, Harbin Engineering University. His research interests include micro- structured fiber-based in-fiber integrated optics, fiber optic devices and components, and fiber optic sensors and its applications. He is the author or coauthor of more than two book, four book chapters, and 280 of his research papers. He is the holder of 25 patents.

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