Composite-Structured Anti-Resonant Fiber with High Temperature Sensitivity for Cancer Cell Detection

This study proposes a novel anti-resonant fiber sensing structure based on a composite “egg-shaped” configuration with surface plasmon resonance (SPR) effect. By designing a novel anti-resonant structure consisting of a semicircle and a semi-ellipse and coating its inner surface with a gold film, the optimal structural parameters are determined through three sets of simulation experiments using temperature sensitivity as the criterion. The optimal sensing structure was applied to the simulated detection and analysis of cancer cells, aiming to provide value and reference for the application of high-sensitivity optical fiber sensor in the field of cancer cell detection. Simulation results show that the proposed sensing structure achieves a maximum temperature sensitivity (TS) of 3.86 nm/°C. For the detection of six different types of cancer cells, the maximum wavelength sensitivity (WS), optimal resolution (R), maximum figure of merit (FOM), maximum signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), and best limit of detection (LOD) reach 12,142.86 nm/RIU, 8.24 × 10−6, 3035.72 RIU−1, 65.50, and 0.94 nm, respectively. Owing to its unique detection mechanism, the proposed sensing structure exhibits label-free characteristics and demonstrates balanced and excellent performance across all metrics for both temperature and cancer cell detection, showing broad application prospects and great potential in the fields of environmental monitoring and medical prevention and treatment.