Exploitation of enhanced fluorescence via cross-coupling principles toward the design of an optical integrated thin-film sensor for nanotechnology and biomedical applications

A novel fluorescence thin-film integrated sensor has been proposed that retains the beneficial selectivity characteristics typical of optical and electronic sensors, while improving the signal-to-noise ratio in a miniature geometry. The sensor can be tuned to measure a wide variety of biological species by varying its thin-film corrugation period. The optical properties of the sensor are determined, in large part, by optical cross coupling through a corrugated metal film and enhanced fluorescence. The surface plasmon to surface plasmon cross coupling was theoretically modeled and experimentally tested. Finally, prospective applications of this sensor in the key areas of nanotechnology and bioengineering are discussed.