Exploring performance of THz metamaterial biosensor based on flexible thin-film.

To extend the application of flexible metamaterial in the biosensor field, a metamaterial biosensor, which consisted of metal elliptical split-ring resonator array with a subwavelength structure based on flexible thin-film (parylene-c), was presented. The structure parameters (ring width, period ratio of structure, gap width, axial ratio) of the elliptical split-ring resonator and polarization direction of incident light were investigated as to how to affect the performances of the flexible metamaterial biosensor. Meanwhile, the permittivity (ε) of the tested sample on the surface of metamaterials biosensor also affected the shift of transmission spectra. The results showed that the sensitivity, quality (Q) factor, and figure of merit (FOM) of the flexible metamaterial biosensor could reach 243 GHz/RIU, 14.2, and 3.3, respectively. Moreover, the full-width-half-maximum (FWHM) was only 82 GHz. Therefore, these results provided an improved direction to design metamaterial biosensors with high Q-factor, low FOM, and high sensitivity, which could meet the need for sample detection in the terahertz regime.