Functional graphene composite films for surface plasmon resonance sensor technology

In this study, a surface plasmon resonance (SPR) based fiber optic sensors coated with pristine graphene and functionalized graphene composite film were evaluated. Graphene synthesized by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) is transferred on the sensing area of the optical fiber. The sensor operates based on the principle that SPR changes according to the refractive indices of analytes. This sensor was evaluated with structural DNA lattice functionalized with biotin (DXB) and streptavidin (SA). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first ever attempt to use graphene as a replacement for conventional metal films. The exact SPR phenomena and the red-shift of 7.276 nm signals for the DXB and SA combination were observed. We believe that the use of graphene as the metallic film in the SPR sensor will lead to a new area of study in biochemical sensing technology.