Sensing and Bio-Sensing Research 34 (2021) 100452

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Sensing and Bio-Sensing Research

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/sbsr

Trapezium-shaped groove photonic crystal fiber plasmon sensor for low

refractive index detection
Yanan Wang a, b, Guangyu Jiang a, b, *, Zijian Yu a, b, Qingke Wang a, b, Xiaoman Jiang a, b
a
School of Measuring and Optical Engineering, Nanchang Hangkong University, Nanchang 330063, China
b
Key Laboratory of Nondestructive Testing, Ministry of Education, Nanchang Hangkong University, Nanchang 330063, China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: A highly sensitive trapezium-shaped groove photonic crystal fiber (TSG-PCF) sensor based on surface plasmon
Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) is proposed and investigated numerically in low refractive index (RI) detection range of
trapezium-shaped groove 1.181.30 by the finite element method (FEM). The trapezoidal groove is introduced, this sensor is simple in
Photonic crystal fiber sensor
structure and manufactured easily. Indium tin oxide (ITO) is set as the sensing layer for the reaction between the
Sensitivity
Resolution
core and the plasma. The influences of the structural parameters such as the holes parameters, the geometric
parameters of the trapezium-shaped groove, the ITO layer thickness and other performance parameters on the
design and sensing features of the proposed sensor are discussed comprehensively. The results show that for the
proposed TSG-PCF, the maximum wavelength and amplitude sensitivities can arrive at 9100 nm/RIU and 99
RIU− 1, the corresponding resolutions are 1.10 × 10− 5 RIU and 1.01 × 10− 4 RIU respectively in the analyte RI
from 1.18 to 1.30. Moreover, the average sensitivity of 3429 nm/RIU can be realized for the appropriate pa­
rameters. The highly sensitive sensor makes the wide potential development for low RI detection in biological
and chemical sensing.

1. Introduction
Photonic crystal fibers (PCFs), as a kind of dielectric cylindrical op­
tical waveguide, are composed of the air-holes and adulterated areas
arranged regularly in a substrate material of different refractive indexes
(RIs). PCFs have many unique properties such as wide-range tunable
dispersion characteristic, very high nonlinear coefficient, and hollow
waveguide transmission [1–5]. Compared with the traditional fibers,
PCFs have been widely applied to supercontinuum broadband light
source, fiber laser, optical amplifier, gas and liquid sensing, etc. [6–10].
Recently, surface plasmon resonance (SPR) technology has appeared
and excited increasing attention in biological, medical, physical, and
chemical sensing due to its unique and superior characteristics, such as
high and easily detectable sensitivity, remote, online, and real-time
measurement. Sensors based on SPR stand out among multitudinous
sensors, and their applications become broader, such as the measure­
ment of RI range and concentration in the liquid detection [11,12], the
determination of gas concentration and the identification of gas types in
the gas detection [13,14], the detection of biomolecules in the medical
tests [15]. Up to now, various kinds of PCF-SPR sensors have been re­
ported, some different sensing properties have been obtained and
improved.
Some PCF-SPR sensors have been presented and designed to form the
internal or external coated structures. For the internal coated structure,
the film layer is coated on part of the area or the surface of the holes, and
the analyte is inside the air hole. Rifat et al. [16] proposed a structure
with the gold coated on the inside of the core and the outside of the
larger air hole, this structure achieved a bigger birefringence and better
sensing ability owing to the air holes of different sizes. Shui et al. [17]
designed a special structure in which the liquid detection was intro­
duced in the core, the silver and TiO2 films were deposited externally in
one of the two air holes in the cladding, and the TiO2 film was on the
outer side of the silver film. Sharma et al. [18] demonstrated a PCF-SPR
structure filled with the magnetic fluid and covered with the gold at the
air hole in the core. Moreover, the different properties of different
temperatures and magnetic fluid compositions were mainly analyzed
and discussed. For the external coating structure, the sensing layer is
deposited in the cladding, i.e., the analyte is outside of the cladding and
inside of the perfect matching layer (PML). Shakya et al. [19] reported
PCF-SPR with an external coating structure, the fiber was covered by the
gold, TiO2 and analytes from the inside to the outside. Islam et al. [20]
offered an ultra-sensitive biochemical sensor only consisting of simple

* Corresponding author at: School of Measuring and Optical Engineering, Nanchang Hangkong University, Nanchang 330063, China.
E-mail address: jgy579@nchu.edu.cn (G. Jiang).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbsr.2021.100452
Received 8 July 2021; Received in revised form 14 September 2021; Accepted 21 September 2021
Available online 29 September 2021
2214-1804/© 2021 Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Y. Wang et al.
circular holes, using either gold or AZO (ZnO doped with 2% Al) as the
plasma material. In this sensor, the common materials such as the silver
and graphene were not employed, but AZO, which is much rarer.
Meanwhile, by comparing the two materials, the results showed that the
sensitivity, resolution and other characteristics obtained by using AZO
as the plasma material were not as good as those obtained by using the
gold as the plasma material. By analyzing the external coating is obvi­
ously more popular than the internal coating. On the one hand, the
former is more convenient and simple, and there is no need to inject the
analyte to be tested into the air holes in a complicated way, especially
for the detection of different analytes in a single channel. On the other
hand, it is easier to control the thickness, length and sensing area of the
sensing layers, which will not only be more uniform, but also reduce the
difficulty of manufacturing.
In addition, the D-type and slotted structure belong to the external
coating structure. The D-type structure is derived from the partial pol­
ishing of the PCF structure, which is named because the remaining part
is shaped like the capital letter D. In general, the plasma film is coated on
the polishing plane and the tested analyte directly contacts with the
plasma film surface, or can be injected into the holes nearest to the film
[21–23]. According to the depth and angle of polishing, the structure
can be further subdivided into the partial polishing, full polishing, single
D-type polishing, double D-type polishing and other structures. Rela­
tively speaking, the D-type structure has a greater advantage in coating,
but the polishing is susceptible to problems such as the roughness and
uneven of polishing surface. For the slotted structures, the large-size
outer coating channels are transformed into microfluidic channels of
various shapes for the better light-matter interaction. Liu et al. [24]
described a sensor with the U-shaped microfluidic channel (for storing
analytes), in which the bottom of the U-shaped groove was coated with
the indium tin oxide (ITO), two sides and the lower part of the U-shaped
groove were covered with circular holes of different sizes.
On the other hand, to obtain various kinds of excellent sensing per­
formances, except for changing the structures to enrich the structural
diversity, the changes can also be made in plasma materials, such as the
gold, silver, copper, aluminum and other metals. Sarker et al. [25]
discovered a kind of slotted PCF-SPR in which the gold was applied and
covered on the outside of the cladding, analyzed the influences of the
parameters such as the wavelength, analyte RI, and slotted inclination
angle on the characteristics such as the confinement loss, sensitivity, and
resolution. Liu et al. [26] demonstrated a partially polished D-type
sensor in which the gold, silver, and ITO in the selection of the plasma
materials were employed and researched the effects of plasma materials
contrastively, found that the gold had a higher confinement loss and was
more suitable for the further research. In addition, the researchers also
explore other sensing materials, such as oxides, oxide-compounds,
metal-nonmetallic multilayered structures [27–30] as the sensing me­
diums, which not only enrich the diversity of sensing materials, but also
produce more and better performances.
Very recently, ITO as a new exciting medium has caught more and
more attention on numerous special and attractive characteristics.
Rahman et al. [31] achieved a hexagonal SPR sensor with the silicon as
the background material and ITO as the sensing layer. By comparing
three different structures, the optimal structure was determined and the
corresponding relationships between each parameter and the sensing
performances were studied. Kaur et al. [32] designed a double-coated D-
type sensor with the metal oxide ZnO added on the surface of the ITO to
achieve higher sensitivity and resolution than the single-layer ITO.
Compared with the gold, silver, and other materials, some performances
of ITO are more superior. For example, ITO can avoid the oxidation of
the silver layer, have a lower plasma frequency, and increase the
penetration depth of the plasma waves [31].
Despite the above progress, the PCF-SPR sensors are still poorly
explored for low RI detection. We present a highly sensitive trapezium-
shaped groove photonic crystal fiber (TSG-PCF) sensor. The sensor takes
on simple construction, the trapezium-shaped groove (TSG) design
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Sensing and Bio-Sensing Research 34 (2021) 100452
allows quicker and easier placement of the analyte, facilitates replace­
ment and cleaning, and the inclinations enlarge the contact area for
faster reaction. The wavelength sensitivity, the resolution and the
average sensitivity of the TSG-PCF sensor are investigated and analyzed.
Additionally, the confinement loss, amplitude sensitivity, and amplitude
resolution are also carefully studied. This will be helpful for under­
standing and exploring the sensing performances of PCF-SPR sensors.
2. Design and theoretical model
The model was created through five steps: geometric parameters
setting, geometric figures creation, materials setting, PML creating, and
mesh setting. Based on the finite element method (FEM), the charac­
teristics can be calculated and relevant parameters are optimized to
obtain the better results. The TSG-PCF sensor structure is shown in
Fig. 1. The PML is wrapped around the outermost part of the fiber to
absorb the radiation waves, while inside the PML, in order, are the silica-
based background material, air holes, and TSG for the analyte. Specif­
ically, the circular holes of two different sizes are designed and arranged
in a hexagon, and the TSG is embedded below the arched hole to place
the analyte. In order to achieve the goal of increased sensitivity, except
for the TSG structure, the larger size air holes are designed in the core
region. The diameters of the two kinds of air holes are respectively
expressed by dc (= 0.8Λ) and da (= 0.5Λ), in which Λ (= 2 μm) is the
spacing between adjacent holes. For the TSG, h represents the depth of
the groove and td denotes the thickness of the ITO layer. The difference
between the top and bottom of the TSG is represented by 2a, and its
inclination is 120◦ . In addition, dp (= 1.1Λ) is the polished depth, which
can be obtained by polishing a large arched hole in the background
material at the top of the fiber.
The RI of the silica is demonstrated by Sellmeier's equation [24]:
A1 λ 2 A2 λ2 A3 λ2
n2 (λ) = 1 + + 2 + 2 (1)
2
λ − B1 λ − B2 λ − B3
where n is the RI of fused silica, and λ is the wavelength in μm. The
parameters A1, A2, A3, B1, B2, and B3 are the Sellmeier constants, which
are 0.69616300, 0.407942600, 0.897479400, 0.00467914826,
0.0135120631, and 97.9340025, respectively.
The frequency-dependent complex relative permittivity of ITO is
expressed by the Drude model [24]:
ω2p
εm = ε∞ − (2)
ω(ω + iγ)
where ε∞ (= 3.9) denotes the dielectric constant at infinite angular
frequency, γ (= 0.111 eV) is the damping frequency of the oscillations, ω
presents the angular frequency, and ωp (= 2.39 eV) is the bulk plasma
Fig. 1. The cross section of the proposed TSG-PCF sensor.
Y. Wang et al. Sensing and Bio-Sensing Research 34 (2021) 100452

frequency. denotes the loss in RI = na.

The confinement loss can be calculated by [24]:
( ) 3. Results and discussions
α(dB/cm) = 8.686 × k0 × Im neff × 104 (3)

where k0 indicates the wave number and can be computed by k0 = 2π/λ,
Im(neff) symbolizes the imaginary part of the index.
There are two conventional methods, called the wavelength inter­
rogation and amplitude interrogation methods, can be adopted for
calculating sensing performance and detecting the RI range. The
wavelength interrogation is frequently used and can be described by
[20]:
/ polarization (SPP) mode are emphatically investigated in Fig. 2(a), (b)
Sλ (nm/RIU) = Δλpeak Δna (4)
where Δλpeak and Δna stand for the difference of the adjacent resonance
wavelengths and analyte RIs, respectively. In addition, the resolution is
also a very important parameter to evaluate the performance of sensor,
which can be expressed by [20]:
/ rapidly augments and arrives a peak value at the wavelength 1311 nm,
R(RIU) = Δna Δλmin Δλpeak (5)
where Δλmin (= 0.1 nm) depicts the minimum resolution of the
spectrometer.
The amplitude sensitivity can be usually adopted for evaluating
effectively the sensing proprieties at a single wavelength which can be
calculated by [20]:
( ) 1 ∂α(λ, na )
SA RIU − 1 = −
α(λ, na ) ∂na
where Δα(λ, na) stands for the difference of two adjacent losses, α(λ, na)
The mode field properties in the TSG-PCF are investigated and
calculated by the FEM. In simulation, we select the generic case for the
set of the structure parameters: Λ = 2 μm, dc = Λ, da = 0.6Λ, dp = 1.1Λ, θ
= 120◦ , h = 2.55 μm, td = 100 nm, and na = 1.22, except where
otherwise noted. Based on these values, the corresponding relationship
between the wavelength and index, as well as the electric field distri­
butions of the core mode (TE and TM modes) and the surface plasmon
respectively. In Fig. 2(a), as the wavelength enhances to 1480 nm from
1180 nm, the variation curve of Re(nTE) keeps decreasing monotonously
and slowly, while those of Re(nTM) and Re(nSPP) reduce at first, then
happen to change up and down at the specific point where the Re(neff) of
the TM and SPP modes intersect at the wavelength 1311 nm, and then
separate and reduce accordingly again. In addition, for the Im(nTM), it
and then steeply declines with the variation of wavelength. However for
the Im(nTE), it is very small and nearly keeps unchanged for the whole
wavelength. The reasons for these variations can be explained and
verified in Fig. 2(a) and (b). The Fig. 2(b) depicts the E-field distribu­
tions of three modes at the wavelengths 1260 nm, 1311 nm, and 1460
nm respectively from left to right. The E-field distributions of the TE
mode mainly concentrate on the core and there is almost no coupling
between TE mode and SPP mode, which is why Im(nTE) barely changes.
(6)
The E-field distributions of the TM and SPP modes will couple mutually,
especially at the wavelength 1311 nm most field intensity will permeate
from the TM mode to the ITO layer. According to Fig. 2(a), the

1.46 0.012
Re(nTE)
(d) Re(nTM )
0.01
1.44 Re(nspp)
Im(nTE)
0.008
Im(nTM )
1.42
Re(n eff)

Im (neff)

0.006

1.4
0.004

1.38
0.002

1.36 0
1160 1200 1240 1280 1320 1360 1400 1440 1480
Wavelength(nm)
(a)

(b)

Fig. 2. (a) The correlation between the wavelength and neff of the TE, TM, and SPP modes. (b) The electric field distributions at the wavelengths 1260 nm, 1311 nm,
and 1460 nm respectively from left to right.

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Y. Wang et al. Sensing and Bio-Sensing Research 34 (2021) 100452

wavelength 1311 nm is exactly the intersection point of Re(nTM) = Re

(nSPP) and the point where the maximum value of Im(nTM) is located,
satisfying the phase matching conditions [20].
Fig. 3 displays the change between the loss and the smaller hole-
diameter da for na = 1.22–1.24. For na = 1.22, the peak of loss spec­
trum elevates with the increase of da; for na = 1.23, the loss rises at the
beginning, then goes down with the variation of da; for na = 1.24, the
loss will decrease with da. On the one hand, the light leaks into the ITO
layer and the energy transfers to SPP mode from TM mode, the loss
changes accordingly. This phenomenon not only leads to the generation
conditions for the matching of the surface plasma wave and the light
wave, i.e., Re(nTM) = Re(nSPP), but also generates the loss peak at the
point where they happen to intersect. On the other hand, the resonance
of SPP mode and TM mode increases, which makes the resonance
wavelength move towards the longer wavelength direction, i.e., the
resonance wavelength will engender a noticeable red shift with the RI.
In addition, the larger and sharper peak loss means that it is easier to be
detected in the detection process, which also indicates that it is more
suitable for the relevant sensing research. Therefore, the parameter da =
0.5Λ is set as the optimal parameter. Fig. 4. The loss spectrum with the variation of the larger holes diameter dc for
Fig. 4 presents the loss spectrum with the variation of the larger air different RIs.
holes diameter dc for different RIs. As dc is increased from 0.6Λ to 0.8Λ,
the peak of loss spectrum also augments but the values change little, and
the shift variation of resonant wavelength is less for a given RI. When the
analyte RI varies between 1.22 and 1.24, the peak declines distinctly,
and the resonance wavelength occurs to shift towards the longer
wavelength. This is because the incremental RI makes the energy
coupling between SPP mode and TM mode weaken, leading to a smaller
loss of TM mode. In addition, with the increase from 1.22 to 1.24 of RI,
the larger dc is, the closer the corresponding loss peak is. To sum up, dc =
0.8Λ is selected as one of the parameters for the following discussion.
The dependency of ITO-coated layer thickness td on the loss is plotted
in Fig. 5. As the td enhances from 90 nm to 110 nm, the resonant
wavelength produces a larger shift towards long wavelength direction.
The reason is that the enlargement of td makes the nSPP become large
while the nTM almost without any change, which results in a noticeable
red shift of the resonance wavelength. For na = 1.22 and 1.23, the loss
peak firstly gets larger and then becomes smaller, but keeps increasing
progressively for na = 1.24 with the increase of td. Additionally, for td =
90 nm and 100 nm, with the na from 1.22 to 1.23 and then to 1.24 the
loss peaks lessen continuously, on the contrary, for td = 110 nm the loss
peaks continue to rise. Given all this, td = 100 nm is chosen for the
further research. On the one hand, the thicker ITO layer not only Fig. 5. The dependency of ITO-coated layer thickness td on the loss for na =
1.22, 1.23, 1.24.

Fig. 3. The change between the loss and the smaller hole-diameter da for na
= 1.22–1.24.
enlarges the difficulty of the interaction between the ITO and the analyte
but reduces the sensitivity. On the other hand, seen from Fig. 5, the loss
is higher at na = 1.22, td = 100 nm and the loss peak is sharper, i.e., the
full width at half maximum (FWHM) is smaller which means more ac­
curate detection of the peak locations and better sensing accuracy.
The influence of the parameter a on the loss is obtained in Fig. 6. The
loss peak happens to shift but only a little when the parameter a is set to
different values for a fixed na. On the other hand, with the increase of
either of the two parameters na and a, the resonance peak always moves
towards the direction of the longer wavelength. For na = 1.22, the loss
has the variation tendency of falling after rising when the parameter a
increases from 1.0 μm to 1.1 μm and then to 1.2 μm. For na = 1.23 and
1.24, the loss spectrum constantly declines with the a varying in 1.0
μm–1.2 μm. Therefore, a = 1.1 μm is adopted for the optimized results.
For the TSG, the effect of the open-TSG depth h on the loss needs to
be considered. As the na enhances in Fig. 7, the loss lessens and the
resonance wavelength has a noticeable red shift. For na = 1.22, the loss
spectrum will decrease with the increasing h, but for h = 2.65 μm and
2.75 μm, the extent of the reduction is negligible. As the na enhances to
1.23 and 1.24, the loss increases with h, but the alteration is also

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Y. Wang et al. Sensing and Bio-Sensing Research 34 (2021) 100452

Fig. 6. The influence of the parameter a on the loss for na = 1.22, 1.23, 1.24. Fig. 8. The variation tendency of the loss with the wavelength as the RI goes
from 1.18 to 1.30.

mode attenuate, reducing the energy transferred to SPP mode and

leading to a smaller loss.
Fig. 9 displays the cubic fitting curve relationship between the
wavelength and analyte RI. The cubic polynomial fitting of the proposed
TSG-PCF sensor can be drawn by the least square method, its function is
y = 225.5 × 3–811.22 + 974.4× - 389.5 and R2 = 0.9992. If the curve is
linearly fitted, its function is y = 3.429× - 2.85 and R2 = 0.9279. By
comparing two fitting degrees, the R2 of the cubic fitting is higher. The
resonant wavelength augments gradually with the increasing RI, which
conforms to the variation rule of the obtained function. The parameter
R2 = 0.9992 is very close to 1.0, indicating a good sensing response of
the proposed TSG-PCF sensor.
The relation between the change in amplitude sensitivity and the
wavelength is plotted and the results are calculated in Fig. 10. By
calculating, the maximum amplitude sensitivity can arrive at 99 RIU− 1
and the minimum one only 24 RIU− 1. Additionally, the results for other
amplitude sensitivities have also been calculated and listed in Table 1.
As the na enlarges, the amplitude sensitivity increases rapidly and then
decreases little by little, which can be explained by the Fig. 8. For a given
Fig. 7. The effect of the open-TSG depth h on the loss for na = 1.22, 1.23, 1.24. na, the amplitude sensitivity tends to increase slowly after experiencing
a dramatical ascend and reduce process by analyzing the the variation of
insignificant. Besides, no matter how the depth h changes, the change of wavelength. This variation changes significantly in na = 1.18–1.26, but
the resonance wavelength can be ignored for a fixed na. The reason for
the above phenomena is that the increase of the depth h engenders the
progressively reducing spacing between the ITO layer and the core, at
the same time further strengthens the coupling effect. However, it is
noticeable that the alterations (both in the loss and resonance wave­
length) are small, indicating that the parameter h has little effect on the
sensing performances.
Fig. 8 shows the variation tendency of the loss with the wavelength
as RI goes from 1.18 to 1.30. When na varies from 1.18 to 1.22 and then
to 1.30, the loss enhances from 2.18 × 103 dB/cm to 4.58 × 103 dB/cm
and then gradually decreases to 2.31 × 103 dB/cm, presenting earlier
increase and later decrease trend. Obviously, at na = 1.22, the loss is the
largest, the loss peak is the sharpest, and the FWHM is the smallest. The
shift of the resonant wavelength is also constantly increasing due to the
significantly increasing red shift, which means that the sensitivity
related to the wavelength shift enlarges with the increasing RI, and its
maximum value 9100 nm/RIU can be achieved at na = 1.29. The main
reason is that the change of na causes the variation of the Re(neff) but
only the nSPP, which engenders the generation of the red shift, enlarging
the sensitivity. In addition, when na continues to enlarge to a certain
value, which will make the energy coupling between SPP mode and TM Fig. 9. The fitting curve relationship between the wavelength and analyte RI.

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Y. Wang et al. Sensing and Bio-Sensing Research 34 (2021) 100452

design, the wheel polishing technique is more widely used. After the side
polishing, the fiber needs to be coated with a thin film before the SPR
sensor can be fabricated completely. The main coating techniques
mainly include the chemical vapor deposition (CVD) and the physical
vapor deposition (including the sputtering coating and the thermal
evaporation coating) [34,36]. Each of these techniques has its own ad­
vantages, for example, CVD can be used to coat on complex shapes and
can be used repeatably, the sputtering coating technique has strong film
adhesion, the thermal evaporation coating technique is easy to operate
and the film thickness can be accurately controlled. All of these tech­
niques can be used for the coating of the proposed sensor.

4. Conclusions

A TSG-PCF sensor coated with ITO is designed and investigated

Fig. 10. The relation between the change in amplitude sensitivity and the
wavelength in the RI range of 1.18 to 1.30.
after the na gradually increases to 1.27, the changing trend changes and
there is no obvious peak value.
The resonant wavelength, resonant peak shift, wavelength sensi­
tivity, wavelength resolution, amplitude sensitivity, and amplitude
resolution are computed separately and listed in the Table 1. The reso­
nant wavelength always moves towards the longer wavelength, which is
reflected numerically by an increasing resonant peak shift. In 1.18–1.30,
the wavelength sensitivity is continuously improved to 9100 nm/RIU,
and instead the corresponding resolution continues to reduce to 1.10 ×
10− 5 RIU, which means the proposed TSG-PCF sensor can achieve low RI
detection with high resolution and sensitivity. Furthermore, the ampli­
tude sensitivity climbs up and then declines, which is consistent with the
variation trend in Fig. 10, and reaches the maximum value at na = 1.22.
The corresponding resolution is inversely proportional to it, decreasing
firstly and increasing subsequently.
With the development of the technology, there have been many
methods to fabricate the PCF-SPR sensor. The fabrication of PCF-SPR
sensor is mainly divided into three parts: the preparation, polishing,
and coating of PCF. The preparation of PCF has been discussed in detail
in [33], we will focus on the polishing and coating techniques of PCF.
The proposed PCF can be polished by the side polishing technique which
is divided into the arc groove polishing technique and the wheel pol­
ishing technique [34,35]. Because the arc groove polishing technique
has some problems such as the difficulty of polishing precision control
and the environmental pollution caused by the use of adhesive, while
the wheel polishing technique is more simple, accurate and diverse in
numerically in a low RI range of 1.18–1.30 by applying the FEM. The
effects of multiple parameters of the proposed sensor on the mode
characteristics and sensing performances are analyzed in detail. Spe­
cifically, the mode field distributions of TE, TM, and SPP modes are
shown, the variations of various RIs at different wavelengths are
analyzed in depth. The structure parameters and performance parame­
ters are taken into account adequately and detailedly, the maximum
wavelength sensitivity of 9100 nm/RIU, the sensing resolution of 1.10
× 10− 5 RIU, and the average sensitivity with 3429 nm/RIU can be
achieved under the condition of suitable parameters. The above analysis
and results demonstrate that this sensor is feasible and promising in
biological and chemical sensing.
Funding
This work was supported by the Natural Science Foundation of China
(61661034 and 11864026), Key Research and Development Program of
Jiangxi Province (20171BBE50012), Jiangxi Provincial Department of
Education Science and Technology Program (DA201808191 and
GJJ180536), Open Foundation of Key Laboratory of Nondestructive
Testing, Ministry of Education (EW201908087), PhD Research Startup
Foundation and Graduate Innovation Fund of Nanchang Hangkong
University (EA201708388 and YC2017050).
Author statement
I have made substantial contributions to the conception or design of
the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the
work; and I have drafted the work or revised it critically for important
intellectual content; and I have approved the final version to be pub­
lished; and I agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work in
ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of
the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.
All persons who have made substantial contributions to the work

Table 1
Performances of the TSG-PCF sensor.
Analyte RI Resonant wavelength Resonant peak shift (nm) Wavelength sensitivity (nm/ Resolution Amplitude sensitivity Resolution
(nm) RIU) (RIU) (RIU− 1) (RIU)
5 4
1.18 1244 16 1600 6.25 × 10− 24.33 4.11 × 10−
5 4
1.19 1260 16 1600 6.25 × 10− 28.11 3.56 × 10−
5 4
1.20 1276 17 1700 5.88 × 10− 34.80 2.87 × 10−
5 4
1.21 1293 18 1800 5.56 × 10− 47.78 2.09 × 10−
5 4
1.22 1311 27 2700 3.70 × 10− 99.01 1.01 × 10−
5 4
1.23 1338 28 2800 3.57 × 10− 71.76 1.39 × 10−
5 4
1.24 1366 32 3200 3.13 × 10− 60.04 1.67 × 10−
5 4
1.25 1398 38 3800 2.63 × 10− 53.26 1.88 × 10−
5 4
1.26 1436 43 4300 2.33 × 10− 48.63 2.06 × 10−
5 4
1.27 1479 50 5000 2.00 × 10− 45.39 2.20 × 10−
5 4
1.28 1529 69 6900 1.45 × 10− 42.91 2.33 × 10−
5 4
1.29 1598 91 9100 1.10 × 10− 41.00 2.44 × 10−
1.30 1689 N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A

6
Y. Wang et al.
reported in the manuscript and have given their written permission to be
named.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
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