Aligned Carbon Nanotube_Based Chemical Sensors with Highly Improved Sensitivity

 描述(申请人提供)：基于纳米管的化学传感器是一种新兴的设备，能够检测与人类健康和安全相关的应用中的分析物。目前制造这些器件的方法包括将碳纳米管引入到表面上，而没有任何方法来促进它们的对准，从而形成了随机取向的纳米管网络。嵌段共聚物将两种不同类型的聚合物系在一起，已知可以组装成有序的形态，这种形态可以通过改变每种类型的聚合物的体积分数来改变。这些聚合物的薄膜可以在具有可控尺寸的微区的表面上形成。以前，金属被沉积在嵌段共聚物薄膜上，以一种优雅的、自下而上的方法形成金属纳米线。这项计划中概述的研究将探索单壁碳纳米管(SWCNT)在具有良好有序形态的嵌段共聚物薄膜上的取向。这里使用的单壁碳纳米管要么是非功能化的，要么是在纳米管的侧壁和端部功能化的。设备将由纳米管取代的聚合物薄膜制造，并测试它们检测不同化学分析物的能力。能够检测到微量气体和挥发性有机化合物的设备已被证明是重要的，因为它们可以防止人类接触危险化合物。这里提出的研究解决了检测这些类型的分析物的方法，并且由于纳米管网络的高对准而提高了灵敏度。 类似的检测双链DNA(DsDNA)特定序列存在的装置有可能被广泛用于疾病诊断和生物制剂检测。虽然已经开发了许多用于检测单链DNA(SsDNA)的传感器，但直接检测自然产生的dsDNA将是该领域的重大进步。在这项建议中开发的dsDNA检测器将作为诊断伯氏疏螺旋体细菌引起的细菌感染莱姆病的工具进行评估。流行的诊断技术包括识别人类宿主产生的针对伯氏杆菌的抗体的存在。在人类宿主中鉴定细菌dsDNA是诊断莱姆病的一种更准确的方法，但目前基于聚合酶链式反应(PCR)的方法昂贵且需要广泛的前处理。本文提出的基于纳米管的dsDNA检测器将能够直接和准确地识别人血清中是否存在特定的dsDNA序列。这可能对莱姆病的诊断有用，因为误诊可能会导致严重的长期副作用和高昂的医疗费用。这里提出的检测器将是一种强大的工具，可以快速准确地诊断许多由细菌感染引起的疾病。

 DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Nanotube-based chemical sensors are an emerging class of devices that are able to detect analytes for applications related to human health and security. Current methods to fabricate these devices involve the introduction of carbon nanotubes onto a surface without any methods to facilitate their alignment, and thus networks of randomly oriented nanotubes are formed. Block copolymers, where two different types of polymers are tethered together, are known to assemble into well-ordered morphologies which can be changed by varying the volume fraction of each type of polymer. Thin films of these polymers can be formed on a surface with domains of controllable size. Previously, metals have been deposited on block copolymer thin films to form metal nanowires in an elegant, bottom-up approach. The research outlined in this proposal will explore the alignment of single walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) on block copolymer thin films with well-ordered morphologies. The SWCNTs used here will either be unfunctionalized or functionalized on the nanotube's sidewall and end. Devices will be fabricated from the nanotube-substituted polymer thin films and tested for their ability to sense different chemical analytes. Devices that can sense minuscule amounts of gaseous and volatile organic compounds have proven to be important because they can prevent human exposure to hazardous compounds. The research proposed here addresses ways to detect these types of analytes with improved sensitivity derived from the high alignment of the nanotube networks. Similar devices that detect the presence of specific sequences of double stranded DNA (dsDNA) have the potential to be used extensively for disease diagnosis and biowarfare agent detection. While many sensors for the detection of single stranded DNA (ssDNA) have been developed, the direct detection of naturally occurring dsDNA would represent a major improvement in the field. The dsDNA detector developed in this proposal will be evaluated as a tool for the diagnosis of the bacterial infection, Lyme disease, derived from Borrelia burgdorferi bacteria. Popular diagnosis techniques involve identifying the presence of antibodies that the human host raises to B. burgdorferi. The identification of bacterial dsDNA in a human host is a more accurate method to diagnosis Lyme disease, however the current polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based methods are expensive and require extensive pretreatment. The nanotube-based dsDNA detector proposed here will be able to directly and accurately identify the presence of specific sequences of dsDNA in human blood serum. This could be useful for Lyme disease diagnosis since misdiagnosis can lead to serious long-term side effects and high health care costs. The detector proposed here would represent a powerful tool for the rapid and accurate diagnosis of many diseases caused by bacterial infection.