Fiber-optic pH sensors fabrication based on selective deposition of neutral red

In this work, a novel application of the electric field directed layer-by-layer self assembly (EFDLA) selective deposition method for the fabrication of optical fiber pH sensors is presented. Here, indium tin oxide (ITO) coated optical fibers have been fabricated via a dip-coating deposition method. These fibers are used as electrodes in the EFDLA protocol in order to deposit selectively the sensitive layer. Neutral Red (NR) colorimetric pH sensitive indicator and the polymers poly(acrylic acid) (PAA) and poly(allylamine hydrochloride) (PAH) are used in order to obtain a pH sensitive nanostructured coating onto ITO coated optical fibers. The results obtained in this work revealed that the LbL material adsorption on the electrodes can be enhanced or even inhibited when applying a specific direct current voltage between them under some other specific fabrication parameters. Particularly, the response of these sensors to variations of the pH in the surrounding medium was studied when the pH of the solutions used for the fabrication of the films was adjusted to 7.0 and the potential applied between electrodes was set to 2.5 V. These sensors showed fast response time and high repeatability.