Analysis and design of photonic crystal malaria biosensor with double nanohole cavity resonator with ultra-high-quality factor

In this work, we design a two-dimensional Photonic crystal(2D-PC) structure to detect the various malarial biomarkers namely the Schizont stage, Trophozoite stage, Ring stage, and Healthy RBC, based on the effective modulation of the refractive index of the biomarkers. This Biosensor is designed with a double nanohole cavity resonator at the center coupled with two quasi-waveguides on a hexagonal lattice with air holes on a silicon slab. A rigorous optimization process was followed to obtain the final optimal structural parameters. The computation of the sensing parameters such as Quality factor, resonating wavelength, and detection limit was carried out by the Finite Difference Time Domain (FDTD) method. The sensor is designed with an ultra-high-quality factor of 6151.58, high transmission of 79.51%, remarkable least detection limit of 4 × 10–3 RIU, 817.66 as a Figure of Merit, and an average sensitivity of 217.5 nm/RIU. The unique double nanohole biosensor was completely designed with an ultra-compact footprint of 43.46µm2.