NIRT: Heterogeneous Integration of Nanowires for Chemical Sensor Arrays

  • Mallouk, Thomas E. (PI)
  • Irwin, Mary Jane (CoPI)
  • Semancik, Steve (CoPI)
  • Lakhtakia, Akhlesh A. (CoPI)
  • Evoy, Stephane (CoPI)

Project: Research project

Project Details

Description

Intellectual merit:'Electronic nose'chemical sensor arrays are used to detect trace analytes

in complex mixtures,and are important for environmental,biomedical,process control,and

security-related applications.Scaling chemical sensors to nanometer dimensions will open

unprecedented opportunities for implementation of electronic nose arrays in and-held devices,

remote monitoring,robotics,medical diagnostics,sensor dust,and other novel applications.

To do this,we must create low cost,low power,massively parallel arrays of chemically diverse

nanosensors and integrate them with on-chip data processing.The proposed project will bring

together an interdisciplinary team from three institutions to work on the fundamental problems

connected with this goal.The project combines the expertise of chemists in nanosensor

synthesis,physicists in materials and device characterization,electrical engineers in

heterogeneous integration and test circuit design,and computer scientists in the design,

fabrication,and testing of novel low-power circuit architectures.While this project focuses

specifically on nanosensor arrays,the problems it addresses are generic to the integration of

many different kinds of functional nanoscale objects into silicon-based circuits.

Our approach builds on an existing knowledge base of chemical sensor array platforms and

data analysis methods,to which our team brings some unique new materials and techniques.

Mallouk and Semancik have developed a method for incorporating chemical sensor 'stripes'into

template-grown metal nanowires.These nanowires connect the lithographic length scale (micron

nanowire length)with the nanoscale (30-300 nm diameter and stripe length).The synthetic

technique allows the chemical nature of the sensory material to be quite diverse.We will focus

on three different sensor platforms -chemoresistive metal oxides,intrinsically conducting

polymers,and conductive polymer composites -which should provide excellent orthogonality in

sensor arrays.The physical properties of the sensory materials and of the nanowires will be

studied using test structures devised by Evoy and Semancik,focusing in particular on the thermal

and temporal signatures of the nanosensor response.The synthesis and physical

characterization of the nanosensors will be tightly coupled so that a molecular-level

understanding of signal transduction and scaling effects can guide the optimization of the sensors.

Mayer and Evoy have developed an electrofluidic alignment technique for placing nanowires in

lithographically defined circuits.This will be a powerful tool for parallel heterogeneous

integration of the nanosensors into large arrays.Issues of yield,device density,and testing/logic

circuit integration will be addressed through a combined approach of simulation and experiment,

in collaboration with Irwin and Narayanan.Finally,Irwin,Narayanan,and Mayer will design

and test a CMOS sensor processing fabric that efficiently controls the duty cycle of sensor

operation and processes the array response locally.Feedback between device/circuit testing and

nanosensor synthesis and characterization will tie the whole project together.

Broader impact:The NIRT team will apply its diverse scientific background in education

and outreach activities at the graduate,undergraduate,high school,and K-8 levels.The research

program has a strong element of mentoring of women,minorities,undergraduates,and high school

students.It will also provide a cross-disciplinary experience for graduate students through

exchange with partner laboratories.In each summer of the program,NIRT faculty and students

will team with Penn State Action Potential staff to develop a series of 5 th -8 th grade science camps

on different current topics.The unique aspect of these camps is that they bring elementary and

middle school teachers together with students,so that teachers can use new curricular material in

a practical environment.NSF funds will be used to support the participation of teachers from

beyond our local area,to increase the geographic and minority impact of the outreach program.

StatusFinished
Effective start/end date8/1/037/31/08

Funding

  • National Science Foundation: $1,200,000.00

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