REDFINCH is a consortium of 8 European research institutes and companies, undertaking cutting edge R&D into novel, high performance, cost-effective chemical sensors, based on Mid-Infrared Photonic Integrated Circuits (MIR PICs). Silicon PICs — integrating optical circuits onto millimeter-size silicon chips — create extremely robust miniature systems, in which discrete components are replaced by on-chip equivalents. This gives a simultaneous improvement in ease of use and a reduction in cost.
The REDFINCH partners are addressing the significant challenge of implementing this in the important mid-infrared region (2 to 20 ?m wavelength range), where many important chemical and biological species have strong absorption fingerprints. This allows for the detection and concentration measurement of a wide range of gases, liquids, and biomolecules, crucial for applications such as health monitoring and diagnosis, detection of biological compounds, monitoring of toxic gases, and many more. Initially, REDFINCH will focus on three specific key applications:
