Microstructured-core photonic-crystal fiber for ultra-sensitive refractive index sensing

Abstract

We propose a novel photonic crystal fiber refractive index sensor which is based on the selectively resonant coupling between a conventional solid core and a microstructured core. The introduced microstructured core is realized by filling the air-holes in the core with low index analyte. We show that a detection limit (DL) of 2.02×10⁻⁶ refractive index unit (RIU) and a sensitivity of 8500 nm/RIU can be achieved for analyte with refractive index of 1.33.