Sub-ppm detection of vapors using piezoresistive microcantilever array sensors

The performance of microfabricated piezoresistive cantilever array sensors has been evaluated using various vapors of volatile organic compounds including alkanes with different chain length from 5 (n-pentane) to 14 (n-tetradecane). We demonstrate that piezoresistive microcantilever array sensors have the selectivity of discriminating individual alkanes in a homologous series as well as common volatile organic compounds according to principal component analysis. We developed a new method to evaluate the sensitivity, taking advantage of the low vapor pressures of alkanes with longer chains, such as n-dodecane, n-tridecane and n-tetradecane, under saturated vapor conditions. This method reveals sub-ppm sensitivity and the cantilever response is found to follow the mass of evaporated analytes as calculated using a quantitative model based on the Langmuir evaporation model.

[1]  C. Vancura,et al.  Magnetically actuated complementary metal oxide semiconductor resonant cantilever gas sensor systems. , 2005, Analytical chemistry.

[2]  James K. Gimzewski,et al.  Surface stress in the self-assembly of alkanethiols on gold , 1997 .

[3]  H. Lang,et al.  A label-free immunosensor array using single-chain antibody fragments. , 2005, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[4]  William Paul King,et al.  Piezoresistive scanning probe arrays for operation in liquids , 2007 .

[5]  C. Ziegler,et al.  A highly sensitive self-oscillating cantilever array for the quantitative and qualitative analysis of organic vapor mixtures , 2006 .

[6]  A. Hierlemann,et al.  Complementary metal oxide semiconductor cantilever arrays on a single chip: mass-sensitive detection of volatile organic compounds. , 2002, Analytical chemistry.

[7]  H. Rothuizen,et al.  Translating biomolecular recognition into nanomechanics. , 2000, Science.

[8]  Martin Hegner,et al.  An Antibody-Sensitized Microfabricated Cantilever for the Growth Detection of Aspergillus niger Spores , 2007, Microscopy and Microanalysis.

[9]  Anja Boisen,et al.  A microcantilever-based alcohol vapor sensor-application and response model , 2000 .

[10]  Olivier Français,et al.  Chemical sensing: millimeter size resonant microcantilever performance , 2004 .

[11]  P. Vettiger,et al.  Piezoresistive Cantilever Array for Life Sciences Applications , 2006 .

[12]  Christoph Hagleitner,et al.  Application-specific sensor systems based on CMOS chemical microsensors , 2000 .

[13]  Marilyne Sousa,et al.  Investigating the molecular mechanisms of in-plane mechanochemistry on cantilever arrays. , 2007, Journal of the American Chemical Society.

[14]  P. Vettiger,et al.  Scanning probe arrays for life sciences and nanobiology applications , 2006 .

[15]  W. Grange,et al.  Rapid and label-free nanomechanical detection of biomarker transcripts in human RNA , 2006, Nature nanotechnology.

[16]  Dominique Rebière,et al.  Silicon made resonant microcantilever: Dependence of the chemical sensing performances on the sensitive coating thickness , 2006 .

[17]  Drechsler,et al.  A cantilever array-based artificial nose , 2000, Ultramicroscopy.

[18]  Ute Drechsler,et al.  5×5 2D AFM cantilever arrays a first step towards a Terabit storage device , 1999 .

[19]  Irving Langmuir,et al.  The Evaporation of Small Spheres , 1918 .