Engineering Commons^™

Tunable Laser Interrogation Of Surface Plasmon Resonance Sensors, Vaibhav Badjatya

University of Kentucky Master's Theses

Surface plasmons are bound TM polarized electromagnetic waves that propagate along the interface of two materials with real dielectric constants of opposite signs. Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensors make use of the surface plasmon waves to detect refractive index changes occurring near this interface. For sensing purposes, this interface typically consists of a metal layer, usually gold or silver, and a liquid dielectric. SPR sensors usually measure the shift in resonance wavelength or resonance angle due to index changes adjacent to the metal layer. However this restricts the limit of detection (LOD), as the regions of low slope (intensity vs. …