Silicon Carbide Nanowire Devices for Label-Free Electrical DNA Detection

Abstract

Silicon Carbide is a promising material to overtake the limitations of Si sensors used forin vivodetection. Here, two different nanodevices are presented. The first one is a SiC NWFET used for electrical detection of DNA molecules. The addition of DNA probe molecules increases the current by 25% and the hybridization with DNA targets increases by 80%. This confirms the efficiency of our sensor to detect DNA. The second one is a Metal Insulator Semicondutor capacitor composed of DNA functionalized SiC nanopillar arrays embedded in a sol-gel silicon dioxide matrix. Capacitance measurements show a singular response between 80 and 100 Hz which is attributed to the presence of DNA molecules.

Silicon Carbide-Based DNA Sensing Technologies

“…Nanowire field effect transistors (nanowire-FETs) are one of the promising bio-sensing techniques and have rigorously been investigated [ 2 , 20 , 21 , 23 , 24 , 46 , 47 ]. These devices offer unique advantages, such as real-time and label-free detection [ 63 ] and high sensitivities for biomolecules such as DNA, RNA, proteins, and ions at femtomolar levels [ 5 , 64 , 65 ].…”

“…Since biomolecules such as DNA are electrically charged molecules, their adsorption on the surface of nanowire FETs can significantly change the transfer characteristics of the FET due to the high surface/volume ratio of the nanowire, which increases the sensitivity of the device [ 63 ]. SiC can be an ideal material for nanowire FET-based biosensors due to its favorable properties, as discussed in the earlier section, with various designs for DNA sensors reported in the literature [ 2 , 20 , 21 , 23 , 24 , 46 ].…”

“…However, Si can undergo chemical reactions in the body’s environment and is therefore not biocompatible [ 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 ] and suffers from instability in long-term uses in biological media and aqueous solutions, resulting in low signal-to-noise ratio and sensor performance issues [ 2 , 10 , 11 , 12 ]. Researchers have been exploring other materials for DNA sensing which are biocompatible, chemically inert and robust, and nontoxic to biomedical environments, such as gallium nitride (GaN) [ 5 ], carbon nanotubes (CNTs) [ 13 , 14 , 15 ], graphene [ 16 , 17 ], silicon carbide (SiC) [ 1 , 2 , 10 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 ], etc. Among them, SiC is one of the most promising materials for DNA sensing.…”

“…Recently SiC-based biosensors have been studied to explore their potential for DNA sensing, with six main technologies reported in the literature. These technologies include: (1) aptamer-modified SiC nanoparticles and quantum dots as fluorescent aptasensor [ 18 , 25 , 45 ], (2) silicon carbide nanoparticle-modified glassy carbon electrode [ 1 ], (3) bio-functionalized SiC nanopillar arrays [ 10 , 23 ], (4) bio-functionalized nanowires [ 19 ], (5) nanowire-based field effect transistor [ 2 , 20 , 21 , 23 , 24 , 46 , 47 ], and (6) nanocrystalline 3C-SiC electrodes [ 22 , 41 , 48 , 49 , 50 ]. This paper presents a concise review of these six SiC-based DNA sensing technologies.…”

“…The testing results from these technologies, when combined with the advantages enabled by the properties of SiC including its electrical conductivity, thermal and mechanical stability, compatibility with Si CMOS fabrication, nontoxicity, -axis: ~400 750~1000 ||c-axis: 800 SiC has excellent electrical properties [28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35] including e breakdown electric field, and high conductivity by doping ( suitable for bioelectronics and biosensor applications [33]. An its capacity to grow a thermally stable native silicon dioxide (S directly compatible with well-established micro-and nan [24,36] for silicon-based devices and complementary metal-oxi applications. The human body contains a variety of salinized proteins, creating a harsh environment that can react with sens coating on the material surface [34].…”