Graphene based fiber optic surface plasmon resonance for bio-chemical sensor applications

In this study, a surface plasmon resonance (SPR) based fiber optic sensor coated with graphene is introduced. A graphene film synthesized by thermal chemical vapor deposition (TCVD) is transferred onto the sensing area of the optical fiber. The detection mechanism of this sensor is based on the principle that the SPR signal changes according to the refractive indices of analytes. Biotinylated Double Crossover DNA (DXB) lattice and protein Streptavidin (SA) were used for the evaluation. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first attempt to use graphene as a replacement for conventional metal films. The exact SPR phenomena and the red-shift of 7.276 nm for the DXB and SA combination were observed. (C) 2013 Elsevier B. V. All rights reserved.