All-Silica Hollow-Core Microstructured Bragg Fibers for Biosensor Application

The possibility to exploit all-silica hollow-core microstructured Bragg fibers to realize a biosensor useful to detect the DNA hybridization process has been investigated. A Bragg fiber recently fabricated has been considered for the analysis performed by means of a full-vector modal solver based on the finite-element method. Since the DNA molecules necessary for the biosensor realization are in aqueous solution, it has been taken into account a microstructured fiber with water-filled holes. The dispersion curve and the confinement loss spectrum have been calculated in order to understand how a biofilm layer on the inner surface of the fiber holes can modify the fundamental mode properties. The numerical analysis results have successfully demonstrated the DNA bio-sensor feasibility in hollow-core Bragg fibers.