Integrated lab-on-a-chip sensor using shallow silicon waveguide multimode interference (MMI) device

摘要

The objective of this work was to develop an integrated general purpose label-free optical sensor using standard photolithography on silicon-on-insulator platform for lab on chip applications. Shallow silicon waveguides have weak confinement in the silicon with lots of field in the cladding. This is advantageous in sensor applications due to the high light matter interaction. Here, we use our shallow strip waveguide platform to design a sensor employing a multimode interference (MMI) section. Utilizing a multi-mode section as short as 4 mm, the sensor exhibits sensitivity ranging from 417 nm / RIU to 427 nm / RIU with a figure of merit from 32 to 133.