Sensitive fluorescence detection with microstructured optical fibers

Microstructured optical fibers allow increased overlap between the evanescent field in the fiber and target species filled within the voids. Through the use of fluorescent dyes this interaction can be exploited, enabling detection of biological species or chemicals through either specific bindings or changes in the fluorescent properties respectively. Here we extend this work by integrating a temperature sensor based on a splice between a conventional silica SMF28 fiber and our MOF, enabling both the temperature of the spliced region and the concentration of target molecules to be measured simultaneously with a single fiber.Erik P. Schartner, Dominic F. Murphy, Heike Ebendorff-Heidepriem and Tanya M. Monr