Liquid-Core Hydrogel Optical Fiber Fluorescence Probes

Abstract

This paper first reports a liquid-core hydrogel optical fiber fluorescence probe. It is composed of a liquid core, a highrefractive-index hydrogel fiber core, and a low-refractive-index hydrogel fiber cladding, which is completely different from many existing optical fiber fluorescence probes. The sensing solution with sensitive materials is sealed as a liquid core, and it can sufficiently react with small-molecule targets penetrating through the hydrogel fiber cladding and core, thus inducing variations in the fluorescence signals. These fluorescence signals can be localized and transmitted within the probe and finally collected and quantified for target detection. This proposed probe can be simply and rapidly fabricated and reused, and it was proven to have high sensitivity, accuracy, and selectivity in practical applications. Therefore, this liquid-core hydrogel optical fiber fluorescence probe will enable a novel sensing platform for small-molecule analyte detection that faces on-site detection challenges.

Optical fiber sensors for water and air quality monitoring: a review

“…There are various methods to classify OFSs based on the different sensing structures and principles of optical fiber. These classifications include optical absorbance-based sensor, 29 , 30 surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor, 31 – 33 Raman sensor, 34 – 36 fluorescence sensor, 37 – 39 and optical interference sensor 40 – 42 In the following sections, we will primarily focus on an introduction to these five different types of OFSs.…”