SPR Technology
Surface Plasmon Resonance (SPR) is changing the way scientists perform research. SPR has emerged as a powerful technique in life science research, drug discovery, electroanalysis, food quality and safety, environmental science and chemical sensor development. It makes research more precise and more efficient.
How does SPR work? By exciting and detecting collective oscillations of free electrons, called surface plasmons, in a metal film. There are several ways to achieve this excitation and detection. A widely used one is the Kretschmann configuration, in which light is focused onto the metal film through a glass prism and the reflection of the light is detected (Fig. A). At a certain incident angle (resonance angle), the plasmons are set to resonate with light, resulting in absorption of light at that angle, creating a dark line in the reflected beam (Fig. B). That dark line contains a wealth of information. A molecular binding event taking place on or near the metal film, or a conformational change in the molecules bound to the film causes a shift in the resonance angle. By monitoring the shift vs. time, researchers can monitor molecular binding events and study the kinetics of the binding without labels (Fig. C).
BI-SPR Technology
. Flow Injection SPR . Electrochemical
SPR
Gas Phase SPR .
Technical Notes
