Nanoparticle-enhanced diffraction gratings for ultrasensitive surface plasmon biosensing

Ultrasensitive surface bioaffinity sensors are created by the adsorption of gold nanoparticles onto gold diffraction gratings. An enhanced diffraction obtained in a surface plasmon resonance geometry is observed due to the optical coupling of the planar surface plasmons in the grating to the localized surface plasmons in the gold nanoparticles. As a first example, these nanoparticle grating biosensors are employed to detect unmodified DNA at a concentration of 10 fM.