Birefringent porous silicon membranes for optical sensing
In this work anisotropic porous silicon is investigated as a material for optical sensing. Birefringence and sensitivity of the anisotropic porous silicon membranes are thoroughly studied in the framework of Bruggeman model which is extended to incorporate the influence of environment effects, such as silicon oxidation. The membranes were also characterized optically demonstrating sensitivity as high as 1245 nm/RIU at 1500 nm. This experimental value only agrees with the theory when it takes into consideration the effect of silicon oxidation. Furthermore we demonstrate that oxidized porous silicon membranes have optical parameters with long term stability. Finally, we developed a new model …
Search for an excess of events with an identical flavour lepton pair and significant missing transverse momentum in root s=7 TeV proton-proton collisions with the ATLAS detector
Results are presented of a search for supersymmetric particles decaying into final states with significant missing transverse momentum and exactly two identical flavour leptons (e or mu) of opposite charge in sqrt{s}=7 TeV collisions at the Large Hadron Collider. This channel is particularly sensitive to supersymmetric particle cascade decays producing flavour correlated lepton pairs. Flavour uncorrelated backgrounds are subtracted using a sample of opposite flavour lepton pair events. Observation of an excess beyond Standard Model expectations following this subtraction procedure would offer one of the best routes to measuring the masses of supersymmetric particles. In a data sample corres…
A polarimetric sensor based on nanoporous free standing membranes
A polarimetric sensor with state of the art sensitivity is developed using free standing porous silicon membranes. The use of an optimized etching receipt greatly reduces the pore roughness. Depolarization factors are thus limited and material birefringence is increased. Free standing membranes are fabricated in n-type substrates and characterized both from the optical and structural point of view. The proposed approach is fully CMOS compatible and can therefore pave the way to the development of cheap microarray that exploits multiplexing capabilities while keeping the amount of analyte required by the analysis down to the microliter level.
Real-time polarimetric optical sensor using macroporous alumina membranes.
We report on the demonstration of real-time refractive index sensing within 60 μm thick free-standing macroporous alumina membranes with pore diameters of 200 nm. The free-standing macroporous alumina membranes allow the analytes to flow through the pores for targeted delivery, resulting in fast sensing responses. The polarimetric measurement platform exploits the optical anisotropy of the membranes in monitoring the refractive index variations of the analytes that fill the pores, providing highly sensitive and real-time measurements. The experimental characterization of the membranes' birefringence at wavelengths of 808, 980, and 1500 nm showed a decrease in birefringence for shorter wavel…
A real time immunoassay in alumina membranes
To date, photonic biosensing with porous membranes has produced slow responses and long sensing times, due to the narrow (less than 100 nm) closed end pores of the membranes used. Recently, polarimetry was used to demonstrate analyte flow through, and real time biosensing in, free-standing porous alumina membranes. Here, we demonstrate how an improved functionalization technology, has for the first time enabled a real-time immunoassay within a porous membrane with a total assay time below one hour. With the new approach, we show a noise floor for individual biosensing measurements of 3.7 ng/ml (25 pM), and a bulk refractive index detection limit of 5×10-6 RIU, with a standard deviation of l…
An advance Towards the Synthesis of Ag Nanorod Arrays with Controlled Surface Roughness for SERS Substrates
An innovative approach to produce silver nanorod (NRs) arrays with controlled morphological parameters and surface roughness is presented. The Ag NRs were obtained using a three-stage fabrication process based on the electron beam exposure of a metal-polymer nanocomposite resist on a transparent substrate and development, a post bake and then a series of non-electrochemical metallization steps. After each step the evolution of the Ag NRs was characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) for morphology and optical transmittance (T) measurements for Localized Surface Plasmon Resonance (LSPR). The transmittance measurements were interpreted using models based on the Finite Element Method…
Dynamically stabilized spin superfluidity in frustrated magnets
We study the onset of spin superfluidity, namely coherent spin transport mediated by a topological spin texture, in frustrated exchange-dominated magnetic systems, engendered by an external magnetic field. We show that for typical device geometries used in nonlocal magnetotransport experiments, the magnetic field stabilizes a spin superflow against fluctuations, up to a critical current. For a given current, the critical field depends on the precessional frequency of the texture, which can be separately controlled. We contrast such dynamic stabilization of a spin superfluid to the conventional approaches based on topological stabilization.
Polarimetric Plasmonic Sensing with Bowtie Nanoantenna Arrays
We propose a polarimetric plasmonic biosensor based on bowtie nanoantenna array transducers. Through numerical simulations, based on the finite element method (FEM), we study the phase retardation between the components of light polarized parallel and perpendicular to the major axis of the bowties within the arrays. From a design for high volumetric sensitivity at a wavelength of 780 nm, sensitivities ∼5 rad/RIU is obtained, corresponding to a detection limit of ∼10−7 when using a polarimetric readout platform. Similarly, surface sensitivity of the same array is evaluated by simulating the phase retardation changes induced by the coverage of bioreceptors and analytes of the metallic nanostr…
Phase-Sensitive Detection for Optical Sensing With Porous Silicon
We report on a photonic sensor with an ultralow limit of detection (LoD) based on a phase interrogation readout scheme together with an anisotropic porous silicon (PSi) membrane. First, the fabrication of porous free-standing membranes from medium doped (100) surface oriented silicon, with pore diameters suitable for the infiltration of biomolecules, around 50 nm, is reported. Then, the phase interrogation scheme for characterizing the PSi membranes is presented whose results show that while volumetric sensitivity increases with the membrane thickness, the resolution in the birefringence measurements decrease dramatically due to depolarization effects. The best LoD was found to be equal to …
Simulation of surface-modified porous silicon photonic crystals for biosensing applications
In this work realistic biosensing structures based on the integration of porous silicon photonic crystals with polymer coating technology are presented. Microcavities and rugate filters are chosen as the photonic crystal configuration. The deposition of a polymer layer on the pore walls of these structures is proposed to improve the selectivity and sensitivity of the sensing function. A complete effective refractive index model including the polymer layer, the target and external effects like silicon oxidation has been developed in order to accurately simulate the structures. It is expected that the proposed structures could be used as low cost, highly integrated and highly sensitive biolog…
Characterization of porous alumina membranes for efficient, real-time, flow through biosensing
Abstract Nanofluidic sensing devices promise high performance by overcoming issues of mass transport of analyte molecules to the sensing surface, whilst micro-porous membranes promise high sensitivity due to a large surface for their capture. Anodic alumina (AAO) filter membranes allow the flow through of samples, and could be used as a convenient and readily available fluidic platform for the targeted delivering of analytes to bioreceptors immobilized on the pore walls. The relatively small pore dimensions, compared to fluidic diffusion lengths, promise highly efficient capture of analytes from the whole sample volume, enabling relatively fast sensing response times and the use of small sa…
Real-time polarimetric biosensing using macroporous alumina membranes
We report the first demonstration of real-time biosensing in free standing macroporous alumina membranes. The membranes with their 200 nm diameter pores are ideal candidates for biosensing applications where fast response times for small sample volumes are needed as they allow analytes to flow through the pores close to the bioreceptors immobilized on the pores walls. A bulk refractive index sensitivity of 5.2x10 -6 refractive index units was obtained from signal responses to different concentrations of NaCl solutions flowing through the pores. Finally, after functionalizing the alumina pore surfaces with an epoxysilane and then spotting it with β-Lactoglobulin protein, the interactions bet…
Real time optical immunosensing with flow-through porous alumina membranes
Through the presentation of analytical data from bioassay experiments, measured by polarimetry, we demonstrate for the first time a real time immunoassay within a free standing macroporous alumina membrane. The 200 nm nominal pore diameter of the membrane enables flow-through, thereby providing an ideal fluidic platform for the targeted delivery of analytes to bioreceptors immobilized on the pore walls, enabling fast sensing response times and the use of small sample volumes (<100 mu L). For the immunoassay, the pore walls were first coated with the functional copolymer, copoly(DMA-NAS) using a novel coupling process, before immobilization of the allergen protein, beta-lactoglobulin, by spo…
Highly-sensitive anisotropic porous silicon based optical sensors
The modeling, fabrication and characterization of PSi fabricated from both (110) and (100) surface oriented silicon for optical sensing is thoroughly reported. First, based on the generalized Bruggeman method, the birefringence and sensitivity of the fabricated membranes were calculated as a function of the fabrication parameters such as porosity and pore sizes; and external effects, such as the pores surface oxidation. Thereafter we report on the fabrication of PSi membranes from (110) and (100) surface oriented silicon with pore sizes in the range of 50 - 80 nm, and the characterization of their birefringence using a polarimetric setup. Their sensitivities were determined by filling the p…