DNA templated compoud semiconductor nanowire sensors

纳米线只是非常细的线，但由于它们的尺寸（比头发细1000倍），它们具有不同寻常和有用的特性。特别是，纳米线中小电流的流动对化学物质的存在作出反应，量子限制允许可控的光致发光特性。许多与工业过程、医疗保健相关的气体（呼吸中的化合物）或环境污染物（氮氧化物、臭氧）都可以使用基于纳米线的设备进行检测。量子点可用于许多应用，如光学条形码和显示屏幕。然而，一些制造和技术障碍仍然存在。制备半导体纳米线的方法是存在的，但这些方法需要精密的设备和高昂的费用。纽卡斯尔大学的研究表明，纳米线可以在水中通过低温反应形成，利用DNA作为模板，在其上形成作为纳米线的半导体。在Touchlight Genetics最近取得进展之前，大量的纯合成DNA是不可获得的。Touchlight和纽卡斯尔之间的合作将旨在开发制造技术，以利用这些进步所带来的传感器制造的新可能性。

Nanowires are simply very thin wires, but they have unusual and useful properties because of their size (1000x thinner than hair).In particular, the flow of small electric currents in a nanowire responds to the presence of chemicals, and quantum confinement allows for controllable photoluminescent properties.Many gases of relevance to industrial processes, or healthcare (compounds in breath), or environmental pollutants (oxides of nitrogen, ozone) can be sensed using nanowire-based devices.Quantum dots can be used for a number of applications, such as optical barcodes and display screens.However, a number of manufacturing and technical obstacles remain. Methods for preparing semiconductor nanowires exist, but these require elaborate equipment and high expense.Work at Newcastle University has shown that nanowires may be formed by low temperature reactions in water using DNA as a template on which to form the semiconductor as a nanowire. Until the recent advances by Touchlight Genetics, large quantities of pure, synthetic DNA were not available.The collaboration between Touchlight and Newcastle will aim to develop manufacturing techniques to exploit the novel possibilities for sensor manufacture that these advances enable.