I-Corps: Ultra-Sensitive and Fast-Response Zinc Oxide Schottky-Contact Ultraviolet Nanosensor

这个i-Corps项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力是提供一种新的方法来生产高灵敏度、快速响应、超低功耗、低成本和高度热稳定性的紫外线传感器。紫外线传感器具有广泛的市场，从工业、制造、健康到消费应用，因此具有巨大的社会和经济影响潜力。公众将从这项创新带来的紫外线传感器技术的资本和经常性成本的大幅降低中受益。这项技术通过提供更低的功耗、更宽的工作温度范围以及灵活的设备实施方式，具有影响紫外线传感器行业的潜力。i-Corps项目将使客户能够发现一种可能影响紫外线(UV)传感器行业的核心技术。由于氧化锌纳米结构具有较大的比表面积和较小的有源区尺寸，因此具有较高的光子导电性，这就导致了对器件性能的高灵敏度。在器件制作中，利用肖特基接触代替传统的欧姆接触，大大提高了纳米氧化锌紫外光传感器的灵敏度和响应时间。此外，该器件可以沉积在硅上，也可以沉积在柔性衬底上。氧化锌紫外光纳米传感器的特性(即性能指标、系统集成、封装、外形因素等)将与当前和未来的客户需求保持一致，同时将探索这项新技术的商业模式。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is to provide a novel approach towards producing high sensitivity, fast response, ultra-low power consumption, low cost, and highly thermal stable UV sensors. UV sensors have wide ranging markets from industrial, manufacturing, health, to consumer applications, and therefore have significant potential for societal and economic impact. The general public will benefit from the significant reduction in the capital and recurring cost of UV sensor technologies brought by the innovation. The technology has the potential to impact the UV sensor industry by providing lower power consumption, wider operation temperature ranges, and the potential for flexible device embodiments.This I-Corps project will enable customer discovery for a core technology that could potentially impact the ultraviolet (UV) sensor industry. Due to large surface-to-volume ratio and reduced dimensionality of the active area, Zinc Oxide (ZnO) nanostructures have been shown to have high photon conductance, which leads to high sensitivity of the device performance. Utilizing the Schottky contact instead of conventional Ohmic contact in device fabrication, the sensitivity and response time of ZnO UV nanosensors have been greatly improved. In addition, the device can be deposited on silicon as well as flexible substrates. The characteristics of the ZnO UV nanosensor (i.e. performance metrics, system integration, packaging, form factors, etc.) will be aligned with current and future customer needs, while at the same time, a business model will be explored for this novel technology.