Development of a Fluorescence-Based Caries Scoring System for an Intraoral Scanner: An in vitro Study.

Objectives: To develop an automated fluorescence-based caries scoring system for an intraoral scanner and totest the performance of the system compared to state-of-the-art methods.

Methods: Seventy-three permanent posterior teeth were scanned with a three-dimensional (3D) intraoral scanner prototype which emitted light at 415 nm. An overlay representing the fluorescence signal from the tissue was mapped onto 3D models of the teeth.

All-polymer photonic crystal slab sensor.

An all-polymer photonic crystal slab sensor is presented, and shown to exhibit narrow resonant reflection with a FWHM of less than 1 nm and a sensitivity of 31 nm/RIU when sensing media with refractive indices around that of water. This results in a detection limit of 4.5 × 10(-6) RIU when measured in conjunction with a spectrometer of 12 pm/pixel resolution.

Compact plasmonic variable optical attenuator.

We demonstrate plasmonic nanowire-based thermo-optic variable optical attenuators operating in the 1525-1625 nm wavelength range. The devices have a footprint as low as 1 mm, extinction ratio exceeding 40 dB, driving voltage below 3 V, and full modulation bandwidth of 1 kHz. The polarization dependent loss is shown to be critically dependent on the nanowire geometry but devices with polarization-dependent loss as low as +/-2.