We propose a temperature sensor design based on surface plasmon resonances (SPRs) supported by filling the holes of a six-hole photonic crystal fiber (PCF) with a silver nanowire. A liquid mixture (ethanol and chloroform) with a large thermo-optic coefficient is filled into the PCF holes as sensing medium. The filled silver nanowires can support resonance peaks and the peak will shift when temperature variations induce changes in the refractive indices of the mixture. By measuring the peak shift, the temperature change can be detected. The resonance peak is extremely sensitive to temperature because the refractive index of the filled mixture is close to that of the PCF material. Our numerical results indicate that a temperature sensitivity as high as 4 nm/K can be achieved and that the most sensitive range of the sensor can be tuned by changing the volume ratios of ethanol and chloroform. Moreover, the maximal sensitivity is relatively stable with random filled nanowires, which will be very convenient for the sensor fabrication.

A surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor based on $D$-shaped microstructured optical fiber (MOF) is proposed to realize the simultaneous measurement of refractive index (RI) and temperature. The $D$-shaped flat surface coated with a gold layer is in direct contact with analyte as a sensing channel of RI, and one of the air holes near the fiber core is filled with chloroform to detect temperature. Two separate channels and birefringence caused by the asymmetric structure can distinguish the variations of RI and temperature independently, thus completely solving the cross-sensitivity problem. This is the first time to realize the simultaneous measurement of multiple parameters without matrix equations, to the best of our knowledge. Results show that the $y$-polarized peak supported by channel I only shifts with RI variation and is unaffected by the temperature floating. Similarly, the $x$-polarized peak supported by channel II is only influenced by the change of temperature in the external environment. The effect of gold layer thickness is investigated numerically, and the sensor sensitivity is identified both in wavelength and amplitude interrogations. This work is very helpful for the design and implementation of a highly sensitive, real-time, and distributed SPR sensor for multi-parameter measurement applications.

A large-mode-area polymer photonic crystal fiber made of polymethyl methacrylate with the cladding having only one layer of air holes near the edge of the fiber is designed and proposed to be used in surface plasmon resonance sensors. In such sensor, a nanoscale metal film and analyte can be deposited on the outer side of the fiber instead of coating or filling in the holes of the conventional PCF, which make the real time detection with high sensitivity easily to realize. Moreover, it is relatively stable to changes of the amount and the diameter of air holes, which is very beneficial for sensor fabrication and sensing applications. Numerical simulation results show that under the conditions of the similar spectral and intensity sensitivity of 8.3 × 10⁻⁵–9.4 × 10⁻⁵ RIU, the confinement loss can be increased dramatically.

An ultra-wide detection range refractive-index sensor based on surface plasmon resonance (SPR) with photonic crystal fiber (PCF) is designed and discussed. The central air hole of the fiber is injected with the analyte. The properties of refractive-index sensor are investigated with different structure parameters. Simulation results show that the proposed sensor has an ultra-wide detection range from 1.29 to 1.49. The refractive index sensitivities of x-polarized and y-polarized core mode are -4156.82 nm/RIU and -3703.64 nm/RIU respectively, and the corresponding linear fitting degrees are 0.99598 and 0.99236. The designed refractive-index sensor with ultra-wide detection range has a great potential in the fields of biology, chemistry, environment and medicine.

A kind of surface plasmon resonance sensor based on grapefruit photonic crystal fiber (PCF) filled with different numbers of silver nanowires has been studied in this paper. The surface plasmon resonance modes and the sensing properties are investigated comprehensively using the finite element method (FEM). The simulation results show that the intensity sensitivity is related to nanowire numbers and the distance between two nanowires. The optimum value obtained is 2,400 nm/RIU, corresponding to a resolution of 4.51 × 10⁻⁵ RIU with a maximum distance of 2 μm. To a certain extent, the PCF filled with more nanowires is better than with just one. Furthermore, the air holes of grapefruit PCF are large enough to operate in practice. Moreover, the irregularity of the filled nanowires has no effect on sensitivity, which will be very convenient for the implementation of experiments.