Abstract
The quick and easy monitoring of heavy metals in drinking water is utmost important due to their harmful effects on human health. In this work, GaN based high electron mobility transistor (HEMT) sensor has been fabricated using optical lithography and explored as a prospective sensor for the determination of trace Pb <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2+</sup> ions present in the water. Graphitic carbon nitride was synthesized by single step combustion method. The g-C <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">3</sub> N <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">4</sub> nanosheets were used to functionalise the gate area of the fabricated GaN HEMT sensor to investigate the presence of Pb <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2+</sup> metal ions in water. The g-C <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">3</sub> N <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">4</sub> functionalized sensor exhibited sensitivity of around 0.46 μA/ppb with 0.32 ppb as Limit of detection (LoD) much below the international set standards. Moreover, the real time measurements on lake water were performed using the developed GaN HEMT sensor to detect the presence of Pb <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2+</sup> ions in real samples in a fast and ultrasensitive manner. We anticipate that the reported work will certainly serve as proof-of-concept to develop heavy metal ion sensors.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have