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Updated: Feb 26, 2026

Determination of the Excitation and Coupling Rates Between Light Emitters and Surface Plasmon Polaritons
Published on: July 21, 2018
Bloch Surface Wave-Coupled Emission at Ultra-Violet Wavelengths
Ramachandram Badugu1, Jieying Mao2, Steve Blair3
1Center for Fluorescence Spectroscopy, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, University of Maryland School of Medicine, 725 West Lombard Street, Baltimore, MD 21201, USA.
Abstract:
The interaction of fluorophores with nearby metallic structures is now an active area of research. Dielectric photonic structures offer some advantages over plasmonic structures, namely small energy losses and less quenching. We describe a dielectric one-dimensional photonic crystal (1DPC), which supports Bloch surface waves (BSWs) from 280 to 440 nm. This BSW structure is a quartz slide coated with alternating layers of SiO2 and Si3N4. We show that this structure displays BSWs and that the near-UV fluorophore, 2-aminopurine (2-AP), on the top surface of the structure couples with the BSWs. Fluorophores do not have to be inside the structure for coupling and show a narrow angular distribution, with an angular separation of wavelengths. The Bloch wave-coupled emission (BWCE) radiates through the dielectric layer. These BSW structures, with useful wavelength range for detection of intrinsic protein and cofactor fluorescence, provide opportunities for novel optical configurations for bioassays with surface-localized biomolecules and for optical imaging using the coupled emission.
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