Nanomaterials enhanced surface plasmon resonance for biological and chemical sensing applications

Abstract

The main challenge for all electrical, mechanical and optical sensors is to detect low molecular weight (less than 400 Da) chemical and biological analytes under extremely dilute conditions. Surface plasmon resonance sensors are the most commonly used optical sensors due to their unique ability for real-time monitoring the molecular binding events. However, their sensitivities are insufficient to detect trace amounts of small molecular weight molecules such as cancer biomarkers, hormones, antibiotics, insecticides, and explosive materials which are respectively important for early-stage disease diagnosis, food quality control, environmental monitoring, and homeland security protection. With the rapid development of nanotechnology in the past few years, nanomaterials-enhanced surface plasmon resonance sensors have been developed and used as effective tools to sense hard-to-detect molecules within the concentration range between pmol and amol. In this review article, we reviewed and discussed the latest trend and challenges in engineering and applications of nanomaterials-enhanced surface plasmon resonance sensors (e.g., metallic nanoparticles, magnetic nanoparticles, carbon-based nanomaterials, latex nanoparticles and liposome nanoparticles) for detecting "hard-to-identify" biological and chemical analytes. Such information will be viable in terms of providing a useful platform for designing future ultrasensitive plasmonic nanosensors.

Graphene–MoS2 hybrid nanostructures enhanced surface plasmon resonance biosensors

“…This process will lead to a larger electric field enhancement at the sensing interface thereby resulting in a higher sensitivity to the target analytes [2]. In our proposed system, MoS 2 layers are used for improving the light absorption in order to provide enough excitation energy for effective charge transfer, while monolayer graphene is acting as bio-recognition component for capturing the target biomolecules through pi-stacking force.…”

“…Two-dimensional (2D) nanomaterials have received great attention from the nanotechnology community in recent years due to their potential applications ranging from transistors to photodetectors [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10]. For example, graphene is one of the most extensively studied 2D nanomaterial to date since its first discovery in 2004 [11].…”

“…This phenomenon is generally referred as surface plasmon resonance (SPR). SPR sensors are the commonly used optical sensors for real-time monitoring of various biomolecular interactions such as DNA hybridization and protein bindings [2,[19][20][21]. Recent studies have shown that graphene can be used as an enhanced SPR substrate for biosensing applications.…”

Optimized Dielectric Film for Maximum Sensitivity of Nearly Guided‐Wave Surface Plasmon Resonance Sensor

“…Nowadays, the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor has been widely recognized as a powerful tool for chemical and biomolecule sensing, [1][2][3] due to its distinctive features such as high sensitivity, label-free measurement, and real-time analysis. For surface plasmon wave excitation, Kretschmann configuration [4] is generally used over other SPR sensing structures.…”

New insights into organic light emitting devices: photophysics, recombination, and out coupling

“…explains that the wave involves both charge motion in the metal ("surface plasmon") and electromagnetic waves in the air or dielectric ("polariton" ) [82,83]. In typical planar OLED stacks around 60% of the light is trapped in plasmon and waveguided modes within the device [84][85][86].…”