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Multiplexed gas detection at room temperature is critical for practical applications, such as for tracking the complex chemical environments associated with food decomposition and spoilage. An integrated array of multiple silicon-based, chemical-sensitive field effect transistors (CSFETs) is presented to realize selective, sensitive, and simultaneous measurement of gases typically associated with food spoilage. CSFETs decorated with sensing materials based on ruthenium, silver, and silicon oxide are used to obtain stable room-temperature responses to ammonia (NH3 ), hydrogen sulfide (H2 S), and humidity, respectively. For example, one multi-CSFET sensor signal changes from its baseline by 13.34 in response to 1 ppm of NH3 , 724.45 under 1 ppm H2 S, and 23.46 under 80% relative humidity, with sensitive detection down to 10 ppb of NH3 and H2 S. To demonstrate this sensor for practical applications, the CSFET sensor array is combined with a custom-printed circuit board into a compact, fully integrated, and portable system to conduct real-time monitoring of gases generated by decomposing food. By using existing silicon-based manufacturing methodologies, this room-temperature gas sensing array can be fabricated reproducibly and at low cost, making it an attractive platform for ambient gas measurement needed in food safety applications.

A classic challenge in chemical sensing is selectivity. Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) are an exciting class of materials because they can be tuned for selective chemical adsorption. Adsorption events trigger work-function shifts, which can be detected with a chemical-sensitive field-effect transistor (power ≈microwatts). In this work, several case studies were used towards generalizing the sensing mechanism, ultimately towards our metal-centric hypothesis. HKUST-1 was used as a proof-of-principle humidity sensor. The response is thickness independent, meaning the response is surface localized. ZIF-8 is demonstrated to be an NO2 -sensing material, and the response is dominated by adsorption at metal sites. Finally, MFM-300(In) shows how standard hard-soft acid-base theory can be used to qualitatively predict sensor responses. This paper sets the groundwork for using the tunability of metal-organic frameworks for chemical sensing with distributed, scalable devices.

As the physical dimensions of a transistor gate continue to shrink to a few atoms, performance can be increasingly determined by the limited electronic density of states (DOS) in the gate and the gate quantum capacitance (CQ). We demonstrate the impact of gate CQ and the dimensionality of the gate electrode on the performance of nanoscale transistors through analytical electrostatics modeling. For low-dimensional gates, the gate charge can limit the channel charge, and the transfer characteristics of the device become dependent on the gate DOS. We experimentally observe for the first time, room-temperature gate quantization features in the transfer characteristics of single-walled carbon nanotube (CNT)-gated ultrathin silicon-on-insulator (SOI) channel transistors; features which can be attributed to the Van Hove singularities in the one-dimensional DOS of the CNT gate. In addition to being an important aspect of future transistor design, potential applications of this phenomenon include multilevel transistors with suitable transfer characteristics obtained via engineered gate DOS.

Detecting accurate concentrations of gas in environments with dynamically changing relative humidity conditions has been a challenge in gas sensing technology. We report a method to eliminate effects of humidity response in chemical-sensitive field-effect transistors using microheaters. Using a hydrogen gas sensor with Pt/FOTS active material as a test case, we demonstrate that a sensor response of 3844% to a relative humidity change of 50 to 90% at 25 °C can be reduced to a negligible response of 11.6% by utilizing microheaters. We also show the advantage of this technique in maintaining the same sensitivity in changing ambient temperatures and its application to the nitrogen dioxide gas sensors.

The reduction of carrier recombination processes by surface passivation is vital for highly efficient crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar cells and bulk wafer metrological characterization. Herein, we report a dip coating passivation of silicon surfaces in ambient air and temperature with Nafion, achieving a champion effective carrier lifetime of 12 ms on high resistivity n-type c-Si, which is comparable to state-of-the-art passivation methods. Nafion is a nonreactive polymer with strong Lewis acidity, thus leading to the formation of a large density of fixed charges at silicon surface, 1-2 orders of magnitude higher than what is achievable with conventional thin-film passivation layers. Notably, Nafion passivates the c-Si surface only by the fixed charges without chemical modification of dangling bonds, which is fundamentally different from the common practice of combining chemical with field-effect passivation. This dip coating process is simple and robust, without the need for complex equipment or parameter optimization as there is no chemical reaction involved.

Drug monitoring plays crucial roles in doping control and precision medicine. It helps physicians tailor drug dosage for optimal benefits, track patients' compliance to prescriptions, and understand the complex pharmacokinetics of drugs. Conventional drug tests rely on invasive blood draws. While urine and sweat are attractive alternative biofluids, the state-of-the-art methods require separate sample collection and processing steps and fail to provide real-time information. Here, a wearable platform equipped with an electrochemical differential pulse voltammetry sensing module for drug monitoring is presented. A methylxanthine drug, caffeine, is selected to demonstrate the platform's functionalities. Sweat caffeine levels are monitored under various conditions, such as drug doses and measurement time after drug intake. Elevated sweat caffeine levels upon increasing dosage and confirmable caffeine physiological trends are observed. This work leverages a wearable sweat sensing platform toward noninvasive and continuous point-of-care drug monitoring and management.

Wearable sweat sensing is a rapidly rising research area driven by its promising potential in health, fitness, and diagnostic applications. Despite the growth in the field, major challenges in relation to sweat metrics remain to be addressed. These challenges include sweat rate monitoring for its complex relation with sweat compositions and sweat sampling for sweat dynamics studies. In this work, we present a flexible microfluidic sweat sensing patch that enhances real-time electrochemical sensing and sweat rate analysis via sweat sampling. The device contains a spiral-patterned microfluidic component that is embedded with ion-selective sensors and an electrical impedance-based sweat rate sensor on a flexible plastic substrate. The patch is enabled to autonomously perform sweat analysis by interfacing the sensing component with a printed circuit board that is capable of on-site signal conditioning, analysis, and transmission. Progressive sweat flow in the microfluidic device, governed by the pressure induced by the secreted sweat, enhances sweat sampling and electrochemical detection via a defined sweat collection chamber and a directed sweat route. The characteristic of the sweat rate sensor is validated through a theoretical simulation, and the precision and accuracy of the flow rate is verified with a commercial syringe pump and a Macroduct sweat collector. On-body simultaneous monitoring of ion (H+, Na+, K+, Cl-) concentration and sweat rate is also demonstrated for sensor functionality. This sweat sensing patch provides an integrated platform for a comprehensive sweat secretion analysis and facilitates physiological and clinical investigations by closely monitoring interrelated sweat parameters.

There is an increasing demand for mass-producible, low-power gas sensors in a wide variety of industrial and consumer applications. Here, we report chemical-sensitive field-effect-transistors (CS-FETs) based on bulk silicon wafers, wherein an electrostatically confined sub-5 nm thin charge inversion layer is modulated by chemical exposure to achieve a high-sensitivity gas-sensing platform. Using hydrogen sensing as a "litmus" test, we demonstrate large sensor responses (>1000%) to 0.5% H2 gas, with fast response (

Flexible pressure sensors have many potential applications in wearable electronics, robotics, health monitoring, and more. In particular, liquid-metal-based sensors are especially promising as they can undergo strains of over 200% without failure. However, current liquid-metal-based strain sensors are incapable of resolving small pressure changes in the few kPa range, making them unsuitable for applications such as heart-rate monitoring, which require a much lower pressure detection resolution. In this paper, a microfluidic tactile diaphragm pressure sensor based on embedded Galinstan microchannels (70 µm width × 70 µm height) capable of resolving sub-50 Pa changes in pressure with sub-100 Pa detection limits and a response time of 90 ms is demonstrated. An embedded equivalent Wheatstone bridge circuit makes the most of tangential and radial strain fields, leading to high sensitivities of a 0.0835 kPa-1 change in output voltage. The Wheatstone bridge also provides temperature self-compensation, allowing for operation in the range of 20-50 °C. As examples of potential applications, a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) wristband with an embedded microfluidic diaphragm pressure sensor capable of real-time pulse monitoring and a PDMS glove with multiple embedded sensors to provide comprehensive tactile feedback of a human hand when touching or holding objects are demonstrated.

Real-time detection of basic physiological parameters such as blood pressure and heart rate is an important target in wearable smart devices for healthcare. Among these, the core body temperature is one of the most important basic medical indicators of fever, insomnia, fatigue, metabolic functionality, and depression. However, traditional wearable temperature sensors are based upon the measurement of skin temperature, which can vary dramatically from the true core body temperature. Here, we demonstrate a three-dimensional (3D) printed wearable "earable" smart device that is designed to be worn on the ear to track core body temperature from the tympanic membrane (i.e., ear drum) based on an infrared sensor. The device is fully integrated with data processing circuits and a wireless module for standalone functionality. Using this smart earable device, we demonstrate that the core body temperature can be accurately monitored regardless of the environment and activity of the user. In addition, a microphone and actuator are also integrated so that the device can also function as a bone conduction hearing aid. Using 3D printing as the fabrication method enables the device to be customized for the wearer for more personalized healthcare. This smart device provides an important advance in realizing personalized health care by enabling real-time monitoring of one of the most important medical parameters, core body temperature, employed in preliminary medical screening tests.

A major challenge in transistor technology scaling is the formation of controlled ultrashallow junctions with nanometer-scale thickness and high spatial uniformity. Monolayer doping (MLD) is an efficient method to form such nanoscale junctions, where the self-limiting nature of semiconductor surfaces is utilized to form adsorbed monolayers of dopant-containing molecules followed by rapid thermal annealing (RTA) to diffuse the dopants to a desired depth. Unlike ion implantation, the process does not induce crystal damage, thus making it highly attractive for nanoscale transistor processing. To date, reported MLD processes have relied on solution processing for monolayer formation. Gas-phase processing, however, benefits from higher intra- and interwafer uniformity and conformal coverage of 3D structures and is more desirable for manufacturing. In this regard, we report a new approach for MLD in silicon and germanium using gas-phase monolayer formation. We call this technology gas-phase monolayer doping (GP-MLD). This method relies on sequential pulse-purge cycles of gas-phase dopant-containing molecules to form a boron- or phosphorus-containing monolayer on a target semiconductor surface. Here, we show the feasibility of our approach through the formation of ultrashallow B- and P-doped junctions on Si and Ge surfaces. The mechanism of adsorption is characterized using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Sub-5 nm junction depths with high dopant dose are obtained as characterized by secondary ion mass spectrometry and sheet resistance measurements. Additionally, we demonstrate that area selectivity can be achieved via lithographic patterning of the monolayer dopants before the diffusion step. The results demonstrate the versatility of the GP-MLD approach for formation of controlled and ultrashallow junctions.

Perspiration-based wearable biosensors facilitate continuous monitoring of individuals' health states with real-time and molecular-level insight. The inherent inaccessibility of sweat in sedentary individuals in large volume (≥10 µL) for on-demand and in situ analysis has limited our ability to capitalize on this noninvasive and rich source of information. A wearable and miniaturized iontophoresis interface is an excellent solution to overcome this barrier. The iontophoresis process involves delivery of stimulating agonists to the sweat glands with the aid of an electrical current. The challenge remains in devising an iontophoresis interface that can extract sufficient amount of sweat for robust sensing, without electrode corrosion and burning/causing discomfort in subjects. Here, we overcame this challenge through realizing an electrochemically enhanced iontophoresis interface, integrated in a wearable sweat analysis platform. This interface can be programmed to induce sweat with various secretion profiles for real-time analysis, a capability which can be exploited to advance our knowledge of the sweat gland physiology and the secretion process. To demonstrate the clinical value of our platform, human subject studies were performed in the context of the cystic fibrosis diagnosis and preliminary investigation of the blood/sweat glucose correlation. With our platform, we detected the elevated sweat electrolyte content of cystic fibrosis patients compared with that of healthy control subjects. Furthermore, our results indicate that oral glucose consumption in the fasting state is followed by increased glucose levels in both sweat and blood. Our solution opens the possibility for a broad range of noninvasive diagnostic and general population health monitoring applications.

Homeostasis of ionized calcium in biofluids is critical for human biological functions and organ systems. Measurement of ionized calcium for clinical applications is not easily accessible due to its strict procedures and dependence on pH. pH balance in body fluids greatly affects metabolic reactions and biological transport systems. Here, we demonstrate a wearable electrochemical device for continuous monitoring of ionized calcium and pH of body fluids using a disposable and flexible array of Ca(2+) and pH sensors that interfaces with a flexible printed circuit board. This platform enables real-time quantitative analysis of these sensing elements in body fluids such as sweat, urine, and tears. Accuracy of Ca(2+) concentration and pH measured by the wearable sensors is validated through inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry technique and a commercial pH meter, respectively. Our results show that the wearable sensors have high repeatability and selectivity to the target ions. Real-time on-body assessment of sweat is also performed, and our results indicate that calcium concentration increases with decreasing pH. This platform can be used in noninvasive continuous analysis of ionized calcium and pH in body fluids for disease diagnosis such as primary hyperparathyroidism and kidney stones.

A flexible and wearable microsensor array is described for simultaneous multiplexed monitoring of heavy metals in human body fluids. Zn, Cd, Pb, Cu, and Hg ions are chosen as target analytes for detection via electrochemical square wave anodic stripping voltammetry (SWASV) on Au and Bi microelectrodes. The oxidation peaks of these metals are calibrated and compensated by incorporating a skin temperature sensor. High selectivity, repeatability, and flexibility of the sensor arrays are presented. Human sweat and urine samples are collected for heavy metal analysis, and measured results from the microsensors are validated through inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). Real-time on-body evaluation of heavy metal (e.g., zinc and copper) levels in sweat of human subjects by cycling is performed to examine the change in concentrations with time. This platform is anticipated to provide insightful information about an individual's health state such as heavy metal exposure and aid the related clinical investigations.

Wearable sensor technologies are essential to the realization of personalized medicine through continuously monitoring an individual's state of health. Sampling human sweat, which is rich in physiological information, could enable non-invasive monitoring. Previously reported sweat-based and other non-invasive biosensors either can only monitor a single analyte at a time or lack on-site signal processing circuitry and sensor calibration mechanisms for accurate analysis of the physiological state. Given the complexity of sweat secretion, simultaneous and multiplexed screening of target biomarkers is critical and requires full system integration to ensure the accuracy of measurements. Here we present a mechanically flexible and fully integrated (that is, no external analysis is needed) sensor array for multiplexed in situ perspiration analysis, which simultaneously and selectively measures sweat metabolites (such as glucose and lactate) and electrolytes (such as sodium and potassium ions), as well as the skin temperature (to calibrate the response of the sensors). Our work bridges the technological gap between signal transduction, conditioning (amplification and filtering), processing and wireless transmission in wearable biosensors by merging plastic-based sensors that interface with the skin with silicon integrated circuits consolidated on a flexible circuit board for complex signal processing. This application could not have been realized using either of these technologies alone owing to their respective inherent limitations. The wearable system is used to measure the detailed sweat profile of human subjects engaged in prolonged indoor and outdoor physical activities, and to make a real-time assessment of the physiological state of the subjects. This platform enables a wide range of personalized diagnostic and physiological monitoring applications.

Perspiration-based wearable biosensors facilitate continuous monitoring of individuals' health states with real-time and molecular-level insight. The inherent inaccessibility of sweat in sedentary individuals in large volume (≥10 µL) for on-demand and in situ analysis has limited our ability to capitalize on this noninvasive and rich source of information. A wearable and miniaturized iontophoresis interface is an excellent solution to overcome this barrier. The iontophoresis process involves delivery of stimulating agonists to the sweat glands with the aid of an electrical current. The challenge remains in devising an iontophoresis interface that can extract sufficient amount of sweat for robust sensing, without electrode corrosion and burning/causing discomfort in subjects. Here, we overcame this challenge through realizing an electrochemically enhanced iontophoresis interface, integrated in a wearable sweat analysis platform. This interface can be programmed to induce sweat with various secretion profiles for real-time analysis, a capability which can be exploited to advance our knowledge of the sweat gland physiology and the secretion process. To demonstrate the clinical value of our platform, human subject studies were performed in the context of the cystic fibrosis diagnosis and preliminary investigation of the blood/sweat glucose correlation. With our platform, we detected the elevated sweat electrolyte content of cystic fibrosis patients compared with that of healthy control subjects. Furthermore, our results indicate that oral glucose consumption in the fasting state is followed by increased glucose levels in both sweat and blood. Our solution opens the possibility for a broad range of noninvasive diagnostic and general population health monitoring applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By integrating 3-D nonplanar fins and 2-D ultrathin bodies, wavy FinFETs merge two formerly competing technologies on a silicon-on-insulator platform to deliver enhanced transistor performance compared with conventional trigate FinFETs with unprecedented levels of chip-area efficiency. This makes it suitable for ultralarge-scale integration high-performance logic at and beyond the 10-nm technology node. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]