Analysis of total uncertainty in spectral peak measurements for plasmonic nanoparticle-based biosensors

One goal of recent research on plasmonic nanoparticle-based sensors is maximizing nanoparticle sensitivity or shift of resonance peak wavelength per refractive index change. Equally important is a measurement system's peak location uncertainty or shift resolution. We provide systematic analyses and discuss optimization of factors that determine peak location uncertainty, reporting values as low as 0.3 nm for the presented scheme. This type of analysis is important, in part, because it provides a means of evaluating detection thresholds for biosensor applications such as analyte binding. We estimate thresholds of 310 streptavidin molecules for the presented scheme and 20 molecules with system improvements. (c) 2007 Optical Society of America.