Highly sensitive differential phase-sensitive surface plasmon resonance biosensor based on the Mach-Zehnder configuration

A high-sensitivity surface plasmon resonance (SPR) biosensor based on the Mach-Zehnder interferometer design is presented. The novel feature of the new design is the use of a Wollaston prism through which the phase quantities of the p and s polarizations are interrogated simultaneously. Since SPR affects only the P polarization, the signal due to the s polarization can be used as the reference. Consequently, the differential phase between the two polarizations allows us to eliminate all common-path phase noise while keeping the phase change caused by the SPR effect. Experimental results obtained from glycerin-water mixtures indicate that the sensitivity limit of our scheme is 5.5 x 10(-8) refractive-index units per 0.01degrees phase change. To our knowledge, this is a significant improvement over previously obtained results when gold was used as the sensor surface. Such an improvement in the sensitivity limit should allow SPR biosensors to become a possible replacement for conventional biosensing techniques based on fluorescence. Monitoring of the bovine serum albumin (BSA) binding reaction with BSA antibodies is also demonstrated. (C) 2004 Optical Society of America.