US-12625064-B2 - Split prism silicon-based liquid immersion microchannel measuring device and method

US12625064B2US 12625064 B2US12625064 B2US 12625064B2US-12625064-B2

Abstract

A split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device includes a microchannel structure including a support and one or more microchannels formed in the support and each having a sample detection layer with a fixed bioadhesive material for detecting a sample, a sample injection unit configured to inject a buffer solution containing the sample into the microchannel, a prism unit having a first prism and a second prism and formed by connecting a vertical surface of the first prism and a vertical surface of the second prism, a blocking part provided in a portion where the first prism and the second prism are connected to each other, the blocking part being configured to block an optical path, a polarized light generating unit configured to generate polarized light, and a polarized light detecting unit configured to detect a polarization change of reflected light.

Inventors

Dong Hyung Kim
Hyun Mo Cho

Assignees

KOREA RESEARCH INSTITUTE OF STANDARDS AND SCIENCE

Dates

Publication Date: 20260512
Application Date: 20240314
Priority Date: 20230404

Claims (14)

1 . A split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device comprising: a microchannel structure including a support and one or more microchannels formed in the support and each having a sample detection layer with a fixed bioadhesive material for detecting a sample; a sample injection unit configured to inject a buffer solution containing the sample into the one or more microchannels; a prism unit having a first prism and a second prism and formed by connecting a vertical surface of the first prism and a vertical surface of the second prism; a blocking part disposed in a portion where the first prism and the second prism are connected to each other, the blocking part being configured to block an optical path; a polarized light generating unit configured to generate polarized light; and a polarized light detecting unit configured to detect a polarization change of reflected light, wherein the polarized light defines incident light that passes through the first prism and enters a first prism-buffer solution interface on which the first prism and the buffer solution adjoin each other, wherein a part of the incident light defines a first reflected light that passes through the first prism-buffer solution interface, is reflected by the sample detection layer, and passes through a second prism-buffer solution interface on which the second prism and the buffer solution adjoin each other, wherein another part of the incident light defines second reflected light that is reflected by the first prism-buffer solution interface, and wherein the second reflected light is absorbed, scattered, or reflected by the blocking part.
2 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 1 , wherein the blocking part is a plate-shaped film, one surface of the blocking part adjoins the vertical surface of the first prism, and another surface of the blocking part adjoins the vertical surface of the second prism.
3 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 1 , wherein the blocking part is made of metal having an extinction coefficient of 0.5 or more and a thickness 20 mm or less.
4 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 1 , wherein the blocking part is made of plastic having a thickness of 20 mm or less.
5 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 1 , wherein the blocking part is a portion where the vertical surface of the first prism having surface roughness and the vertical surface of the second prism having surface roughness adjoin each other.
6 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 5 , wherein the vertical surface of the first prism and the vertical surface of the second prism each have surface roughness of 1 nm to 1 mm.
7 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 1 , wherein a part of the incident light defines transmitted light that passes through the buffer solution and enters the sample detection layer at an incident angle that satisfies a p-polarized wave non-reflection condition, and the transmitted light defines the first reflected light that is reflected by the sample detection layer and then passes through the second prism-buffer solution interface.
8 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 1 , wherein the sample detection layer comprises: a substrate; a dielectric thin film formed on the substrate; and an adsorption layer formed on the dielectric thin film, and wherein the bioadhesive material for detecting the sample is fixed to the adsorption layer.
9 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 8 , wherein the substrate is made of one or more materials selected from silicon, a dielectric material, or a semiconductor.
10 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 8 , wherein the polarized light detecting unit calculates a thickness or concentration of the sample absorbed by the adsorption layer based on a polarization change of the first reflected light.
11 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 1 , wherein the polarized light generating unit adjusts a light amount of the incident light entering the first prism and controls a shape of a beam spot of the incident light formed on the first prism-buffer solution interface.
12 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 1 , wherein the sample injection unit injects gas, instead of the buffer solution, into the one or more microchannels to measure a biomarker contained in air or the gas.
13 . The split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 12 , wherein when the gas is injected into the one or more microchannels, the polarized light defines incident light that passes through the first prism and enters a first prism-gas interface on which the first prism and the gas adjoin each other, and a part of the incident light defines the first reflected light that passes through the first prism-gas interface, is reflected by the sample detection layer, and passes through a second prism-gas interface on which the second prism and the gas adjoin each other.
14 . A split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring method using the split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device of claim 1 , the split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring method comprising: injecting, by the sample injection unit, a buffer solution into the microchannel structure including at least one microchannel having the sample detection layer with the fixed bioadhesive material for detecting the sample; adsorbing the sample contained in the buffer solution to an antibody of the sample detection layer, generating polarized light by the polarized light generating unit; allowing the polarized light to define incident light that passes through the first prism and enters the first prism-buffer solution interface on which the first prism and the buffer solution adjoin each other, allowing a part of the incident light to define transmitted light that passes through the buffer solution and enters the sample detection layer at an incident angle that satisfies a polarized wave non-reflection condition and allowing another part of the incident light to define the second reflected light that is reflected by the first prism-buffer solution interface; allowing the transmitted light to define first reflected light that is reflected by the sample detection layer, passes through the second prism-buffer solution interface, on which the second prism and the buffer solution adjoin each other, and passes through the second prism and removing the second reflected light by the blocking part provided in a portion where the first prism and the second prism adjoin each other, detecting, by the polarized light detecting unit, a polarization change of the first reflected light; and detecting concentration of the sample adsorbed to the sample detection layer based on the polarization change of the first reflected light, wherein the second reflected light is absorbed, scattered, or reflected by the blocking part such that only the first reflected light reflected by the sample detection layer is selectively detected.

Description

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION The present application claims priority to Korean Patent Application No. 10-2023-0044345, filed on Apr. 4, 2023, the entire contents of which are incorporated herein for all purposes by this reference. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION Field of the Invention The present disclosure relates to a split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device and method, and more particularly, to a split prism silicon-based immersion microchannel measuring device and method, in which a split prism is manufactured by joining portions of the prisms that adjoin each other based on the prisms made of two optical materials, and a second reflected light, which is reflected by an interface between a first prism and a buffer solution, is absorbed or scattered by a blocking part formed in a portion where the two prisms are joined in order to selectively detect only a first reflected light reflected by a sample detection layer. Description of the Related Art Reflectometry and ellipsometry are optical analysis techniques which measure a change of the reflectance or a polarization state of reflected light reflected from a surface of a sample and analyze the measured value to find a thickness and optical properties of the sample. Measurement equipment using the same includes a reflectometer and an ellipsometer. The measurement equipment is utilized to evaluate thicknesses and physical properties of various nano-level thin films during a process of manufacturing a nano-thin film in a semiconductor industry. Further, efforts are continuing to expand an application range to a bio-industry to apply them to interface analysis of biomaterials such as proteins, DNA, viruses, and new drug materials. The reflectometer of the related art is sufficient to evaluate a thickness and a physical property of a nano-thin film having a size of several nanometers (nm) or larger. However, there is a problem in that measurement sensitivity for analyzing a low molecular weight biomaterial requiring sensitivity in the range of approximately 1 to 0.001 nanometer is low so that the reliability is degraded. As compared with the reflectometer, the ellipsometer has measurement sensitivity of 0.01 nm or lower. Particularly, the measurement sensitivity is high in the condition that the refractive index is comparatively large as in the case of measuring the thickness of the oxide film having a relatively small refractive index as compared with the semiconductor on the high refractive index semiconductor substrate. However, in order to analyze the low molecular biomaterial using the ellipsometer, a measurement method with improved sensitivity is required. As a technique of the related art for improvement of the measurement sensitivity at the time of analyzing the biomaterial, a surface plasmon resonance sensor (hereinafter, referred to as an “SPR” sensor) in which reflectometry and a surface plasmon resonance technique are combined is known. The surface plasmon resonance (SPR) phenomenon is known as a phenomenon that when electrons on a metal surface are excited by light waves to be collectively vibrated in a normal direction of the surface, light energy is absorbed at this time. It is known that the SPR sensor can not only measure the thickness and the refractive index change of the nano-thin film which is in contact with the metal surface using the surface plasmon resonance phenomenon sensitive to a polarization characteristic of the light, but also measure the change of an adsorption concentration of a biomaterial in a real time in a non-labeling manner which does not use a fluorescent material. The SPR sensor is manufactured to have a structure in which a metal thin film of several tens of nanometers is coated on a material such as glass and a biomaterial can be bonded thereto and uses a principle that when a sample dissolved in a buffer solution is bonded to the sensor, a resonance angle is changed. The resonance angle is obtained by measuring the reflectance. When light is incident onto the SPR sensor, the glass material serves as an incident medium and the light passes through a thin film layer to which the biomaterial is bonded so that the buffer solution finally serves as a substrate. With this structure, a refractive index of the buffer solution corresponding to the substrate material directly affects the shift of the resonance angle as well as the change of the biological thin film layer by the adhesion of the sample to be measured. Therefore, in order to measure only pure binding kinetics, the refractive index of the buffer solution needs to be independently measured and corrected. In order to correct the change of the refractive index of the buffer solution and prevent the error due to the diffusion between the sample and the buffer solution, a method of correcting the error using a delicate valve device, an air injecting device, and two or more channels in which one is used as a reference channel has been u