Surface plasmon polariton-enhanced upconversion luminescence for biosensing applications.

Upconversion luminescence (UCL) has great potential for highly sensitive biosensing due to its unique wavelength shift properties. The main limitation of UCL is its low quantum efficiency, which is typically compensated using low-noise detectors and high-intensity excitation. In this work, we demonstrate surface plasmon polariton (SPP)-enhanced UCL for biosensing applications.

Roll-to-roll fabrication of integrated PDMS-paper microfluidics for nucleic acid amplification.

Microfluidic-based integrated molecular diagnostic systems, which are automated, sensitive, specific, user-friendly, robust, rapid, easy-to-use, and portable, can revolutionize future medicine. Current research and development largely relies on polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) to fabricate microfluidic devices. Since the transition from the proof-of-principle phase to clinical studies requires a vast number of integrated microfluidic devices, there is a need for a high-volume manufacturing method of silicone-based microfluidics.

Influence of an AlO surface coating on the response of polymeric waveguide sensors.

The responses of a polymer ridge waveguide Young interferometer with and without a bilayer of AlO/TiO, fabricated by atomic layer deposition, are studied and compared when applied as an aqueous chemical sensor. The phase shift of the guided mode, as a result of the change in refractive index of the cover medium, is monitored. The results indicate that the over-coating affects the linearity of the sensor response.

Hybrid layered polymer slot waveguide Young interferometer.

We demonstrate a polymer slot waveguide Young interferometer coated with a bilayer of AlO/TiO. The approach enables relaxed dimensions of the polymer waveguide which simplifies the fabrication of the structure with a resolution of 50 nm. The layers were coated by an atomic layer deposition technique.

Disposable photonic integrated circuits for evanescent wave sensors by ultra-high volume roll-to-roll method.

Flexible photonic integrated circuit technology is an emerging field expanding the usage possibilities of photonics, particularly in sensor applications, by enabling the realization of conformable devices and introduction of new alternative production methods. Here, we demonstrate that disposable polymeric photonic integrated circuit devices can be produced in lengths of hundreds of meters by ultra-high volume roll-to-roll methods on a flexible carrier. Attenuation properties of hundreds of individual devices were measured confirming that waveguides with good and repeatable performance were fabricated.

Compensation of drift by using a multichannel integrated Young interferometer.

Polymer-based integrated Young interferometer (YI) sensor chips have proven to be sensitive and have potential to be mass-manufactured. The sensing method is however, disturbed by the mechanical drifts, thus requiring well stabilized and isolated measurement setups that limit its applicability to low-cost readers for rapid diagnostics. In this paper we derive a method for the compensation of mechanical drift by using a multichannel integrated YI chip having two reference channels.

Polymeric slot waveguide interferometer for sensor applications.

A refractive index sensor based on slot waveguide Young interferometer was developed in this work. The interferometer was fabricated on a polymer platform and operates at a visible wavelength of 633 nm. The phase shift of the interference pattern was measured with various concentrations of glucose-water solutions, utilizing both TE and TM polarization states.