title: Low-cost plastic plasmonic substrates for operation in aqueous environments.
abstract: We report a novel design of a multilayer stack to attain surface-plasmon-coupled emission (SPCE) enhancements in liquid medium. Variation in thickness of the multilayer affects the position and depth of resonance plasmon dips. Numerical investigation resulted in an optimal stack configuration that supports long-range surface plasmons. SPCE substrates were prepared on plain BK7 glass and Teflon-AF coated polycarbonate (PC-T) substrates by modifying their surface functionalities using plasma etching. The changes in refractive indices due to the presence of the fluoropolymer layer help reduce the SPCE exit angle from α = 75° (plain BK7) to α = 60° (PC-T) in water without requiring specialized optics.
authors.affiliation: Center for Advanced Sensor Technology and Department of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering, University of Maryland Baltimore County, 1000 Hilltop Circle, Baltimore, Maryland 21250, USA.
authors.forename: Ramamurthy
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Sai Sathish
authors.forename: Yordan
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kostov
authors.forename: Govind
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Rao