Ultrasensitive optical sensing in aqueous solution based on microfiber modal interferometer

Abstract

In this paper, an ultrahigh sensitivity sensing in aqueous solution for microfiber modal interferometer (MMI) is realized. The group refractive index (RI) difference between HE₁₁ and HE₁₂ mode will come down to 0 at a certain wavelength, resulting in ultrahigh sensitivity near this wavelength. MMI with different diameters have their individual ultrasensitive wavelength band, which indicates the broad range of optional probing wavelength and more liberal diameter condition on fiber fabrication. In the experimentation, infrared absorption band in water around 1360-1600nm is easy to keep away by adjusting the microfiber diameter. As a result, an ultrahigh sensitivity of 14.95 pm/ppm is realized for sodium nitrate at 1320nm, whose equivalent sensitivity is about 1.26 × 10⁵-nm/RIU for RI, which is much higher than most of the existing naked sensors with magnitude of 10²-10⁴nm/RIU.