On the temperature sensing capability of a fibre optic SPR mechanism based on bimetallic alloy nanoparticles

Abstract

In this work, we have investigated the capability of different bimetallic nanoparticle alloy combinations to be used in fibre optic temperature sensing based on the technique of surface plasmon resonance (SPR). The metals considered for the present analysis are silver, gold and aluminium. The analysis is derived mainly from the thermo-optic effect along with some fundamental concepts of metal optics such as surface scattering, phonon-electron scattering and electron-electron scattering. The performance of the sensor with three different bimetallic nanoparticle alloy combinations is evaluated and compared, numerically, in terms of its sensitivity and accuracy. On the basis of the comparison and some logistic criterion, we predict the best possible bimetallic alloy combination along with a requisite alloy composition ratio that simultaneously provides higher values of both sensitivity and accuracy which is not possible with any single metallic nanoparticle layer.

A review of the optical properties of alloys and intermetallics for plasmonics

“…Nanograined materials can be effectively modelled using a linear combination of the dielectric functions of the constituent metals, weighted by their respective stoichiometries, with an additional damping term to simulate scattering by grain boundaries [57][58][59].…”

Plasmonic Fiber Optic Refractometric Sensors: From Conventional Architectures to Recent Design Trends

“…Refractive index of the fiber core (i.e., typically fused silica) and plasmonic coating materials do not change significantly with temperature [ 119 , 120 ]. Therefore, temperature SPR fiber sensors are typically constructed using dielectric materials with a high-value thermo-optic coefficients deposited onto the sensor surface [ 121 , 122 , 123 , 124 ]. SPR fiber optic sensors for pressure detection have also been demonstrated.…”

One-Dimensional Photonic Crystal Inner Coated Hollow Fiber Sensor Based on Bloch Surface Wave With Ultra-High Figure of Merit

“…It may be not very adaptive for the bio-molecular sensing which is mainly based on the RI change of the surface. However, the applications based on sensing the change of bulk RI, such as temperature monitoring, are very suitable for this sensor [31], [32]. It could be easily turned into a high performance temperature sensor by filling with some liquid with high RI and high thermal RI coefficient.…”