Graphene-on-silver substrates for sensitive surface plasmon resonance imaging biosensors

• Published in: Optics express Vol. 19; no. 2; pp. 458 - 466
• Main Authors: Choi, Seung Ho, Kim, Young L, Byun, Kyung Min
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 17-01-2011
• Subjects: Biopolymers - analysis; Biosensing Techniques - instrumentation; Equipment Design; Equipment Failure Analysis; Graphite - chemistry; Silver - chemistry; Surface Plasmon Resonance - instrumentation
• ISSN: 1094-4087; 1094-4087
• DOI: 10.1364/OE.19.000458

Taking advantage of the high impermeability property of graphene and the sharp surface plasmon resonance (SPR) curve of silver, we numerically demonstrate that SPR imaging biosensors with a graphene-on-silver substrate can be used to achieve the dramatically high sensitivity as well as to prevent silver oxidation. Results of our numerical study show that a silver substrate with a few graphene layers can significantly increase the imaging sensitivity, compared to the conventional gold-film-based SPR imaging biosensor. In particular, single layered graphene deposited on the 60-nm thick silver film amplifies the SPR imaging signal more than three times. Therefore, the proposed SPR substrate could potentially open a new possibility of SPR imaging detection for sensitive and high-throughput assessment of multiple biomolecular interactions.