Article
Materials Science, Multidisciplinary
Kossi A. A. Min-Dianey, Haochun Zhang, Noe Landry Privace M'Bouana, Ali Imran, Phuong V. Pham, Xinlin Xia
Summary: The study investigated the light transmission properties through one-dimensional photonic crystal with porous materials, and found that increasing porosity narrows the transmission passband and makes the stopband more visible, while an increase in unit cells results in the formation of a transmission stopband.
MATERIALS TODAY COMMUNICATIONS
(2022)
Article
Chemistry, Multidisciplinary
Young Geon Kim, Sihun Park, Shin-Hyun Kim
Summary: Photonic materials with periodic refractive index changes exhibit unique optical properties and show promise for various applications. Recently, photonic microparticles produced using emulsion templates have attracted attention. These microparticles can be used as building blocks for macroscopic materials or as miniaturized photonic devices. This article reviews the progress and state of the art in the field, covering microfluidic production methods, microparticle geometries, optical properties, and applications. Two bottom-up approaches based on colloidal assembly and liquid crystals are discussed and compared.
CHEMICAL COMMUNICATIONS
(2022)
Article
Polymer Science
Naiyu Liu, Zhikun Zheng, Dingshan Yu, Wei Hong, Hailu Liu, Xudong Chen
Summary: A facile method for building responsive photonic crystal patterns was developed, utilizing commercially printed patterns as masks to induce invisible patterns through wetting. The masked areas exhibit strong structural colors while the unmasked areas remain transparent, providing a unique and reversible wetting feature. This programmable printing technique is expected to be an environmentally friendly approach for scalable invisible optical anti-counterfeiting technology.
Article
Materials Science, Multidisciplinary
Bin Guan, Keying Guo, Beatriz Prieto-Simon, Nicolas H. Voelcker
Summary: The fabrication and functionalisation of all-polymer photonic structures show great potential in creating robust and versatile optical sensing platforms in biosensing applications.
Article
Nanoscience & Nanotechnology
Harshit Agarwal, Kayleigh E. Nyffeler, Uttam Manna, Helen E. Blackwell, David M. Lynn
Summary: We present the design and characterization of liquid crystal-infused porous polymer membranes for detecting and reporting on amphiphiles in aqueous solutions. These LC-infused surfaces exhibit slippery behaviors, allowing for facile naked-eye detection and discrimination of amphiphiles based on sliding times of aqueous droplets, offering new applications for antifouling materials in environmental sensing and beyond.
ACS APPLIED MATERIALS & INTERFACES
(2021)
Article
Chemistry, Analytical
Bing Liu, Letian Li, Wenzhao Liu, Qianshan Chen, Zhaoyang Wu
Summary: In this study, a UO22+ responsive interpenetrating porous photonic crystal ball (IPPCB) sensor was developed, which achieved fast and sensitive detection of UO22+ through coordination, showing high selectivity and excellent regeneration performance.
Article
Chemistry, Applied
Meghana Mary Thomas, Parvathy R. Chandran, V. V. Vipin, A. P. Mohamed, Peter Kingshott, Saju Pillai
Summary: The responsive core-shell microspheres were obtained by emulsion polymerization and used for the preparation of colloidal photonic crystals with distinct photonic stop bands in the visible light region. These crystals were able to facilitate rapid, reversible detection of acetone by tuning their photonic stop bands. The feasibility of using these microspheres as a sensing platform for acetone detection was demonstrated in this study.
REACTIVE & FUNCTIONAL POLYMERS
(2021)
Article
Engineering, Electrical & Electronic
Shweta Mehta, Suchitra Vankalkunti, Pawan Kumar Kachhap, Prakash Ratan Gautam, Mandeep Singh
Summary: This study proposes a photonic crystal refractive-index sensor for the detection of volatile organic compounds (VOC). Two sensor designs using Y-splitter photonic crystal waveguide are analyzed using the finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method. Simultaneous monitoring of two different analytes is possible across the arms of the Y-splitter. The use of porous silicon (p-Si) rods with a porosity of 25% creates a variable refractive index sensing region, resulting in a relative shift in the resonant wavelength of the traveling mode. The numerical simulations confirm a sensitivity of -195.83 nm/RIU and a figure-of-merit of -24.482 RIU-1 in the presence of hazardous alcohols.
MATERIALS SCIENCE IN SEMICONDUCTOR PROCESSING
(2023)
Article
Chemistry, Physical
Ahmed Mehaney, Mazen M. Abadla, Hussein A. Elsayed
Summary: This new design for sensing and detecting chemical and biomedical fluids is based on the change in their refractive indices, utilizing a combination of porous silicon photonic crystal and a metallic cap. The sensor shows higher performance than previous 1D photonic crystal sensors, with high sensitivity to changes in void refractive index, providing higher sensitivity and quality factor.
JOURNAL OF MOLECULAR LIQUIDS
(2021)
Article
Engineering, Electrical & Electronic
A. S. Shalaby, Sagr Alamri, D. Mohamed, Arafa H. Aly, S. K. Awasthi, Z. S. Matar, M. T. Tamam
Summary: This work examines the transmission properties of one-dimensional defect photonic crystal suitable for biosensing applications. By observing the change in transmission peaks of defect mode inside photonic bandgap caused by different water-borne bacteria samples, the performance of the proposed biosensor is verified, showing high sensitivity and figure of merit suitable for biosensing applications.
OPTICAL AND QUANTUM ELECTRONICS
(2021)
Article
Chemistry, Applied
Guoqiang Fu, Xiuqin Zhang, Xuemei Chu, Yahong Zhou, Xinyu Peng, Yankun Chen, Meng Su, Minxuan Kuang, Yanlin Song
Summary: The study introduced a textile dyeing technique based on structural colors using poly(StMMA-AA) colloids to fabricate vivid iridescent structural colors and photonic crystal patterns on textiles. It was found that factors such as surface wettability, assembly temperature, particle concentration, spraying distance, and spraying time were important in creating high-quality photonic crystals on textiles. The as-prepared structural-colored fabrics displayed a flexible and tough character due to the soft shell of the colloids with abundant COOH groups.
Article
Materials Science, Multidisciplinary
Alexey Yu. Bobrovsky, Sergey Svyakhovskiy, Ilya V. Roslyakov, Alexey A. Piryazev, Dimitri A. Ivanov, Valery P. Shibaev, Martin Cigl, Vera Hamplova, Alexej Bubnov
Summary: Photo-tunable photonic structures filled with photochromic azobenzene-containing compounds were prepared and their properties were studied. Irradiation with polarized blue light resulted in spectral changes associated with photo-orientation of azobenzene moieties. The observed photoinduced split was reversible and could be fully recovered by heating. The prepared composites have great potential in photonics applications.
ACS APPLIED POLYMER MATERIALS
(2022)
Article
Chemistry, Multidisciplinary
Jiasheng Xu, Qiang Zhao, Tingyi Hu, Xin Chen, Yuhua Cao
Summary: A simple and rapid method was used to self-assemble the core of Fe3O4 CNCs through miniemulsification and evaporation, enabling control of the size of Fe3O4 CNCs by adjusting additives and reaction conditions. The prepared Fe3O4@SiO2 nanoparticles could change the structural color, showing a simplified regulation of the structure color of magnetically responsive photonic crystals.
JOURNAL OF NANOPARTICLE RESEARCH
(2021)
Article
Chemistry, Analytical
Andrei Pligovka, Alexander Poznyak, Malgorzata Norek
Summary: Three types of niobia nanostructured films were formed using different methods and their properties were studied. The films exhibited varying refractive index characteristics and reflectance spectrum peaks, which could be used for creating photonic crystals.
Article
Optics
Furu Zhong, Bin Sun, Jun Tang, Juan He, Yu Zhang, Qingjing Luo
Summary: PhCs with rough surfaces were used to enhance the formation of electromagnetic hotspots and promote SERS activity. The porous silicon PhCs were synthesized and deposited with gold nanoparticles to achieve a SERS substrate for ultratrace chemical sensing. The study demonstrated that the enhanced SERS activity was attributed to the optical characteristics of black silicon and the interaction time period due to the photonic crystals, showing potential for selective detection of military explosives.
Article
Chemistry, Medicinal
Christopher Heuer, Heidi Leonard, Nadav Nitzan, Ariella Lavy-Alperovitch, Naama Massad-Ivanir, Thomas Scheper, Ester Segal
ACS INFECTIOUS DISEASES
(2020)
Article
Chemistry, Multidisciplinary
Sofia Arshavsky Graham, Evgeniy Boyko, Rachel Salama, Ester Segal
Article
Chemistry, Analytical
Sofia Arshavsky-Graham, Anton Enders, Shanny Ackerman, Janina Bahnemann, Ester Segal
Summary: Microfluidic integration of a 3D-printed polyacrylate-based platform with a label-free PSi-based optical aptasensor has been achieved for the first time, showing improved selectivity and detection limit for a model target protein. Superior performance of the 3D-printed microfluidic aptasensor was demonstrated compared to a conventional PDMS-based microfluidic platform with similar dimensions.
Article
Chemistry, Multidisciplinary
Simon J. Ward, Rabeb Layouni, Sofia Arshavsky-Graham, Ester Segal, Sharon M. Weiss
Summary: By applying complex Morlet wavelet convolution to Fabry-Perot interference fringes of thin film reflectometric biosensors, this study effectively filters out white noise and low-frequency reflectance variations, leading to a significant reduction in the limit of detection (LOD).
Review
Biotechnology & Applied Microbiology
Sofia Arshavsky-Graham, Christopher Heuer, Xin Jiang, Ester Segal
Summary: Since the invention of the first biosensors 70 years ago, they have become valuable tools for various applications. Antibodies have traditionally been used as capture probes in biosensors, but suffer from limitations such as size, conjugation chemistry, stability, and cost. Aptamers have emerged as promising alternatives, offering advantages over antibodies and introducing new biosensing concepts.
ENGINEERING IN LIFE SCIENCES
(2022)
Review
Chemistry, Physical
Christopher Heuer, Janina Bahnemann, Thomas Scheper, Ester Segal
Summary: The past year has highlighted the critical need for rapid and feasible fungal disease diagnostics due to the link between the COVID-19 pandemic and the global spread of severe fungal infections. Although progress in the diagnosis and treatment of fungal infections is limited, early diagnosis and patient-tailored therapy are key in reducing morbidity. Antifungal susceptibility testing plays a crucial role in initiating correct antifungal therapy, but current gold standard methods are time-consuming, limiting their clinical application. This review focuses on the advancements in novel AFST techniques and their implications in clinical workflow, aiming to identify gaps hindering progress towards clinical application.
Article
Chemistry, Analytical
Rachel Salama, Sofia Arshavsky-Graham, Osnat Sella-Tavor, Naama Massad-Ivanir, Ester Segal
Summary: We present a label-free optical biosensor based on porous silicon (PSi) for sensitive and continuous detection of protein biomarkers in gastrointestinal fluids. The biosensor can continuously monitor the target protein in complex GI fluids without sample preparation and washing steps.
Article
Pharmacology & Pharmacy
Ofer Prinz Setter, Iser Snoyman, Ghazal Shalash, Ester Segal
Summary: In this study, a superior antibacterial photothermal effect was achieved by incorporating gold nanorods onto clay nanotubes functionalized with anti-E. coli antibodies. The functionalized nanotubes showed a stronger antibacterial effect compared to free gold nanorods under the same power, and had no significant effect on non-target bacteria. This localization of photothermal ablation was attributed to the binding of functionalized nanotubes to target bacteria.
Article
Engineering, Biomedical
Elena Prudnikov, Iryna Polishchuk, Andy Sand, Hanan Abu Hamad, Naama Massad-Ivanir, Ester Segal, Boaz Pokroy
Summary: Superhydrophobic coatings made from natural saturated fatty acids offer a safe and sustainable alternative to current coatings. These coatings, formed through deposition techniques, exhibit high water contact angles and low contact angle hysteresis. The specific fatty acid used and deposition technique affect the properties and morphology of the coatings. Additionally, the fatty acid coatings demonstrate thermal stability and antimicrobial properties, making them ideal for applications in various fields.
MATERIALS TODAY BIO
(2023)
Review
Biochemical Research Methods
Ofer Prinz Setter, Xin Jiang, Ester Segal
Summary: Analytical microbiology has made significant progress in designing sensors for bacteria detection, but the importance of sensor surface properties is often overlooked. This article highlights the significant role of sensor surface properties in the complex process of bacterial transition from planktonic to sessile and discusses their effect on bio-solid interface and sensing capabilities. Recent examples of rationally-designed surfaces for enhanced bacterial detection are presented.
CURRENT OPINION IN BIOTECHNOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Materials Science, Multidisciplinary
Elina Haimov-Talmoud, Michal Rosenberg, Sofia Arshavsky-Graham, Eli Varon, Orit Shefi, Ester Segal
Summary: This study introduces a highly localized focal photodynamic therapy strategy by directly delivering photosensitizer-loaded carriers to cancerous tumors using a biolistic delivery system. Degradable porous silicon microparticles are used as carriers to enhance the efficiency of photodynamic therapy. The results demonstrate significant therapeutic effects in breast cancer cells and tumor xenografts using this method.
ADVANCED MATERIALS TECHNOLOGIES
(2023)
Article
Biochemical Research Methods
Christopher Heuer, John-Alexander Preuss, Marc Buttkewitz, Thomas Scheper, Ester Segal, Janina Bahnemann
Summary: With the rise of antimicrobial resistance, there is an urgent need for rapid point-of-care antimicrobial susceptibility testing (AST) diagnostics. This study introduces a 3D-printed microfluidic gradient generator that can automatically produce dilution series of antimicrobials for testing. By integrating photonic silicon chips, the researchers were able to track bacterial behavior and growth in real-time. The assay successfully determined the minimum inhibitory concentration within less than 90 minutes.
Article
Chemistry, Physical
Heidi Leonard, Xin Jiang, Sofia Arshavsky-Graham, Liran Holtzman, Yuri Haimov, Daniel Weizman, Sarel Halachmi, Ester Segal
Summary: This research uses a special measurement method of silicon diffraction gratings to observe the interaction between bacterial cells and inorganic microstructured surfaces in real-time. The results indicate that specific material characteristics and bacterial cell characteristics are the driving factors for bacterial adherence to specific surfaces and biofilm formation. This study can be applied to predict antibiotic efficacy and biofilm formation, as well as the design of surface-based biosensors and anti-biofouling strategies.
NANOSCALE HORIZONS
(2022)
Article
Chemistry, Analytical
Sofia Arshavsky-Graham, Simon J. Ward, Naama Massad-Ivanir, Thomas Scheper, Sharon M. Weiss, Ester Segal
Summary: AGR2 protein serves as an attractive biomarker for various types of cancer, including pancreatic cancer, where it is secreted to the pancreatic juice by premalignant lesions. A biosensor based on anti-AGR2 aptamers on nanostructured porous silicon thin film enables sensitive and selective detection of AGR2, with potential for early cancer diagnosis. Various strategies, including isotachophoresis and signal processing techniques, have been employed to enhance the biosensor sensitivity and achieve a limit of detection of 15 nM.
ACS MEASUREMENT SCIENCE AU
(2021)
Article
Nanoscience & Nanotechnology
Ofer Prinz Setter, Ariel Movsowitz, Sarah Goldberg, Ester Segal
Summary: Halloysite nanotubes (HNTs) have emerged as a promising nanomaterial for various applications due to their large pore volume, high specific surface area, and biocompatibility. This research focuses on designing and synthesizing functionalized HNTs to selectively bind to target bacterial cells, providing a method for treating challenging heterogeneous cell populations. The functionalized HNTs show selective binding to target bacteria and demonstrate biocompatibility, serving as a generic platform for targeted delivery against any microorganism through facile antibody adjustment.
ACS APPLIED BIO MATERIALS
(2021)
