The investigation of light-matter interaction has had growing interest in the field of photonics. In particular, metalinsulator-metal (MIM) sensors are of interest owing to their high sensitivity compared to conventional sensor made by a single metal layer. The high resolution and low concentrations detection is a result of the sharp resonance of the surface plasmon polariton waveguide hybrid mode at the Au/water interface supported by MIM structures. In this context, we have implemented experiments and theoretical simulations to estimate the enhancement of the sensitivity of metal-insulatormetal sensors. By changing the refractive index of an aqueous solution of glucose, we found that the use of a metalinsulator-metal stack improves the figure of merit of the sensor 7.5 times compared to that of a conventional surface plasmon resonance sensor.

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N. Andam, S. Refki, S. Hayasi, A. Rahmouni, H. Ishitobi, D. V. Nesterenko, Y. Inouye, and Z. Sekkat, "Plasmonic coupled modes in metal-insulator-metal structures for sensing applications," Proc. SPIE 10722, Plasmonics: Design, Materials, Fabrication, Characterization, and Applications XVI, 107220O (Presented at SPIE Nanoscience + Engineering: August 21, 2018; Published: 19 September 2018); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2319936.