• Journal of the Optical Society of Korea
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.65-76
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• 2010

Plasmonic-based biosensing technologies have been successfully commercialized and applied for monitoring various biomolecular interactions occurring at a sensor surface. In particular, the recent advances in nanofabrication methods and nanoparticle syntheses provide a new route to overcome the limitations of a conventional surface plasmon resonance biosensor, such as detection limit, sensitivity, selectivity, and throughput. In this paper, optical and physical properties of plasmonic nanostructures and their contributions to a realization of enhanced optical detection platforms are reviewed. Following vast surveys of the exploitation of metallic nanostructures supporting localized field enhancement, we will propose an outlook for future directions associated with a development of new types of plasmonic sensing substrates

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2010.11a
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• pp.421-422
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• 2010

• Current Optics and Photonics
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• v.4 no.5
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• pp.428-433
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• 2020

Recently, the on-chip autofocus (AF) function has become essential to the CMOS image sensor. An auto-focus usually operates using phase detection of the photocurrent difference from a pair of AF pixels that have focused or defocused. However, the phase-detection method requires a pair of AF pixels for comparison of readout. Therefore, the pixel variation may reduce AF performance. In this paper, we propose a color-selective AF pixel with a plasmonic nanostructure in a 0.9 μ㎡ pixel. The suggested AF pixel requires one pixel for AF function. The plasmonic nanostructure uses metal-insulator-metal (MIM) stack arrays instead of a color filter (CF). The color filters are formed at the subwavelength, and they transmit the specific wavelength of light according to the stack period and incident angles. For the optical analysis of the pixel, a finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) simulation was conducted. The analysis showed that the MIM stack arrays in the pixels perform as an AF pixel. As the primary metric of AF performance, the resulting AF contrasts are 1.8 for the red pixels, 1.6 for green, and 1.5 blue. Based on the simulation results, we confirmed the autofocusing performance of the MIM stack arrays.

• Advances in nano research
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.417-426
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• 2022

Bisphenol A (BPA) is one of the chemicals used in monomer epoxy resins and polycarbonate plastics. The surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) method is precise for identifying biological materials and chemicals at considerably low concentrations. In the present article, the substrates coated with gold nanoparticles have been studied to identify BPA and control the diseases caused by this chemical. Gold nanoparticles were made by a simple chemical method and by applying gold salt and trisodium citrate dihydrate reductant and were coated on glass substrates by a spin-coat approach. Finally, using these SERS substrates as plasmonic sensors and Raman spectroscopy, the Raman signal enhancement of molecular vibrations of BPA was investigated. Then, the molecular vibrations of BPA in some consumer goods were identified by applying SERS substrates as plasmonic sensors and Raman spectroscopy. The fabricated gold nanoparticles are spherical and quasi-spherical nanoparticles that confirm the formation of gold nanoparticles by observing the plasmon resonance peak at 517 nm. Active SERS substrates have been coated with nanoparticles, which improve the Raman signal. The enhancement of the Raman signal is due to the resonance of the surface plasmons of the nanoparticles. Active SERS substrates, gold nanoparticles deposited on a glass substrate, were fabricated for the detection of BPA; a detection limit of 10-9 M and a relative standard deviation (RSD) equal to 4.17% were obtained for ten repeated measurements in the concentration of 10-9 M. Hence, the Raman results indicate that the active SERS substrates, gold nanoparticles for the detection of BPA along with the developed methods, show promising results for SERS-based studies and can lead to the development of microsensors. In Raman spectroscopy, SERS active substrate coated with gold nanoparticles are of interest, which is larger than gold particles due to the resonance of the surface plasmons of gold nanoparticles and the scattering of light from gold particles since the Raman signal amplifies the molecular vibrations of BPA. By decreasing the concentration of BPA deposited on the active SERS substrates, the Raman signal is also weakened due to the reduction of molecular vibrations. By increasing the surface roughness of the active SERS substrates, the Raman signal can be enhanced due to increased light scattering from rough centers, which are the same as the larger particles created throughout the deposition by the spin-coat method, and as a result, they enhance the signal by increasing the scattering of light. Then, the molecular vibrations of BPA were identified in some consumer goods by SERS substrates as plasmonic sensors and Raman spectroscopy.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.275-279
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• 2018

In this study, we introduce a sensing platform based on a plasmonic metasurface absorber (MA) with a vertical nanogap for the ultrasensitive detection of monolayer molecules. The vertical nanogap of the MA, where the extremely high near-field is uniformly distributed and exposed to the external environment, is formed by an under-cut structure between a metallic cross nanoantenna and the mirror layer. The accessible sensing area and the enhanced near-field of the MA further enhance the sensitivity of surface-enhanced infrared absorption for the target molecule of 1-octadecanethiol. To provide strong coupling between the molecular vibrations and plasmonic resonance, the design parameters of the MA with a vertical nanogap are numerically designed.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2013.08a
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• pp.87-87
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• 2013

The interface between nanomaterials and biosystems is emerging as one of the broadest and most dynamic areas of science and technology, bringing together biology, chemistry, physics and many areas of engineering, biomedicine. The combination of these diverse areas of research promised to yield revolutionary advances in healthcare, medicine, and life science. For example, the creation of new and powerful nanosensors that enable direct, sensitive, and rapid analysis of biological and chemical species can advance the diagnosis and treatment of disease, discovery and screening of new drug molecules. Nanowire based sensors are emerging as a powerful and general platform for ultrasensitive and multiplex detection of biological and chemical species. Here, we present the studies about noble metal nanowire sensors that can be used for sensitive detection of a wide-range of biological and chemical species including nucleic acids, proteins, and toxic metal ions. Moreover, the optical and electrochemical applications of noble metal nanowires are introduced. Noble metal nanowires are successfully used as plasmonic antennas and nanoelectrodes, thereby provide a pathway for a single molecule sensor, in vivo neural recording, and molecular injection and detection in a single living cell.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.118-122
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• 2020

This paper proposes a specific sensor-design strategy and the possibility of improving the sensing performance, which can be obtained by replacing part of the existing plasmonic sensor based on the Kretschmann configuration method with an effective refractive-index layer. By replacing the metal layer with an effective refractive-index layer composed of gold and the material to be sensed, an improvement in the detection performance, accompanied by an increase in the sensed incident angle, is observed, and the gold-composition ratio that demonstrates the best result is presented. Subsequently, an increase in the sensed incident angle generated in the previous step can be suppressed by randomly etching a portion of the prism adjacent to the metal layer in a sub-wavelength scale. Finally, this study analyzes the optimization of the metal-layer thickness in a given sensor structure. An effective refractive thin-film surface plasmon resonance sensor design that can achieve optimal sensing performance is then proposed.

• Korean Journal of Metals and Materials
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• v.46 no.7
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• pp.464-470
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• 2008

Metallic nanostructures have great potential for bio-chemical sensor applications due to the excitation of localized surface plasmon and its sensitive response to environmental change. Unlike the commonly explored absorption-based sensing, the optical scattering provides single particle detection scheme. For the localized surface plasmon resonance spectroscopy, the metallic nanostructures with controlled shape and size have been usually fabricated on adhesion-layer pre-coated transparent glass substrates. In this study, we calculated the optical scattering properties of plasmonic Au nanodisc using a discrete dipole approximation method and analyzed the effect of adhesion layer on them. Our result also indicates that there is a trade-off between the surface plasmon damping and the capability of supporting nanostructures in determining the optimal thickness of adhesion layer. Marginal thickness of Ti adhesion layer for supporting Au nanostructures fabricated on a silica glass substrate was experimentally analyzed by an adhesion strength test using a nano-indentation technique.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.33 no.5
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• pp.363-369
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• 2016

We explored localized plasmonic field enhancements using nanowire patterns to improve the sensitivity of a surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor. Two different materials, gold and silver, were considered for sample materials. Gold and silver nanowire patterns were fabricated by electron beam lithography for experimental measurements. The wavelength SPR sensor was also designed for these experiments. The material-dependent field enhancements on nanowire patterns were first calculated based on Maxwell's equations. Resonance wavelength shifts were indicated as changes in the refractive index from 1.33 to 1.36. The SPR sensor with silver nanowire patterns showed a much larger resonance wavelength shift than the sensor with gold nanowire patterns, in good agreement with simulation results. These results suggest that silver nanowire patterns are more efficient than gold nanowire patterns, and could be used for sensitivity enhancements in situations where biocompatibility is not a consideration.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2014.02a
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• pp.413-413
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• 2014

In this paper, we present a fabrication method of functionalized gold nanostructures on flexible substrate that can be implemented for plasmonic sensing application. For biomolecular sensing, many researchers exploit unconventional lithography method like nanoimprint lithography (NIP), contact transfer lithography, soft lithography, colloidal transfer printing due to its usability and easy to functionalization. In particular, nanoimprint and contact transfer lithography need to have anti-adhesion layer for distinctive metallic properties on the flexible substrates. However, when metallic thin film was deposited on the anti-adhesion layer coated substrates, we discover much aggravation of the mold by repetitive use. Thus it would be impossible to get a high quality of metal nanostructure on the transferred substrate for developing flexible electronics based transfer printing. Here we demonstrate a method for nano-pillar mold and transfer the controllable nanoparticle array on the flexible substrates without an anti-adhesion layer. Also functionalization of gold was investigated by the different length of thiol applied for effectively localized surface plasmonic resonance sensing. First, a focused ion beam (FIB) and ICP-RIE are used to fabricate the nanoscale pillar array. Then gold metal layer is deposited onto the patterned nanostructure. The metallic 130 nm and 250 nm nanodisk pattern are transferred onto flexible polymer substrate by bi-layer functionalized contact imprinting which can be tunable surface energy interfaces. Different thiol reagents such as Thioglycolic acid (98%), 3-Mercaptopropionic acid (99%), 11-Mercaptoundecanoic acid (95%) and 16-Mercaptohexadecanoic acid (90%) are used. Overcoming the repeatedly usage of the anti-adhesion layer mold which has less uniformity and not washable interface, contact printing method using bi-layer gold array are not only expedient access to fabrication but also have distinctive properties including anti-adhesion layer free, functionalized bottom of the gold nano disk, repeatedly replicate the pattern on the flexible substrate. As a result we demonstrate the feasibility of flexible plasmonic sensing interface and anticipate that the method can be extended to variable application including the portable bio sensor via mass production of stable nanostructure array and other nanophotonic application.