Long period grating working in transition mode as promising technological platform for label-free biosensing.

We present the development of a platform for label-free biosensing based on overlayered Long Period Gratings (LPGs) working in transition mode. Nano-scale layers of Polystyrene (PS) with different thicknesses were deposited onto the same LPG to test the performances of the device in different working points of its modified sensitivity characteristic. Adsorption dynamic of biotinylated bovine serum albumin (BBSA) onto the PS overlays was on-line monitored as well as a subsequent streptavidin (SA) binding dynamic on the biotinylated sites of the protein ad-layer. Experimental results show that overlayered LPGs are among the most sensitive refractive index transducers to be employed in label-free biochemical detection and that wide margins of further optimization exist. (C) 2009 Optical Society of America