Proposal and analysis of ultra-high amplitude-sensitive refractive index sensor by thick silicon multi-slot sub-wavelength Bragg grating waveguide

In this paper, we proposed an ultra-high amplitude-sensitive multi-slot sub-wavelength Bragg grating (MS-SW BG) waveguide sensor on silicon on insulator (SOI) platform with a thick silicon waveguide (WG) and analyzed the design and performances. The MS-SW BG sensor with a thick waveguide supports multi-transverse modes for the first and second modes, whose stopbands (SBs) have different center wavelengths and bandwidths to form a mid-transmission band (MTB) between these SBs. By adjusting sensor parameters, the MTB can be made sharp and steep, and these spectral profiles shift in response to a refractive index change in the surrounding medium. Due to the sharp spectral feature of the MTB, ultra-high amplitude-sensitive performance can be realized. The sensor length is as short as about 10 μm for a grating period count of 21. With an additional increase of the period count the transmission peak count in the MTB region increases, and the shortest wavelength peak among them exhibits steeper slope which is suitable for higher sensitivity. The appearance of the MTB is explained by coupled mode theory and band structure approach. The structural design is investigated from viewpoints of WG thickness, WG width, duty ratio of the grating and so on to demonstrate an ultra-high amplitude sensitivity of 5000 RIU−1 with transmission loss limit up to 3 dB.