Electrokinetic-assisted gating in a microfluidic integrated Si nanoribbon ion sensor for enhanced sensitivity

Abstract

Using the electrokinetic principle, we demonstrate a novel approach to modulate the response of an ion sensitive silicon-nanoribbon field-effect-transistor, effectively manipulating the device sensitivity to a change in surface potential. By using the streaming potential effect we show that the changes in the surface potential induced by e.g. a pH change can be accurately manipulated in a microfluidic-integrated chip leading to an enhanced response. By varying the flow velocity and the biasing condition along the microfluidic channel, we further demonstrate that the pH response from such a device can also be suppressed or even reversed as a function of the flow velocity and the biasing configuration. Experiments performed with different pH buffer shows that the sensor response can be enhanced/suppressed by several times in magnitude simply by using the streaming potential effects. A mathematical description is also presented for qualitative assessment of the electrokinetic influence on the gate terminal under different biasing condition. The approach presented here shows the prospect to exploit the electrokinetic modulation for developing highly sensitive nanoscale biosensors.