Thermally Stable Optical Filtering Using Silicon-Based Comb-Like Asymmetric Grating for Sensing Applications

Abstract

A silicon-based compact comb-like asymmetric grating is proposed as a thermally stable optical filter for label-free sensing applications. The device is designed and fabricated with a cavity section introduced between the two grating regions which are partially etched in the lateral direction to ensure the nonzero coupling of the fundamental and first-order modes in the propagation and counter-propagation direction. To demonstrate refractive index sensing, resonance shift in the device is measured with sodium chloride (NaCl) dissolved in DI water. In contrast to conventional Bragg grating where stopband lies in the transmission spectrum, the proposed device allows a single narrow passband transmission peak with a large Free Spectral Range (FSR) attributed to the engineered photonic bandgap of two modes present in the waveguide region. The device is deliberately designed such that slightly wide resonance peak is obtained that makes device operation thermally stable for a large temperature variation of ±15 K. A higher-order leaky mode with strong light-analyte interaction (due to long corrugation width) in the gratings governs high sensitivity of ≈352 nm/RIU for different concentrations of NaCl from 0% to 10% in the Deionized (DI) water with a small footprint area of 18~{\mu } {m}^{\textsf {2}} only. Proposed filter characteristics are well suited for multifunctional applications in integrated photonic devices. © 2001-2012 IEEE.