Semiconductor Electrochemical Imagers for Cell Sensing

在拟议的计划中，我们设计了可以拍摄活细胞照片的半导体芯片。然而，我们不是用光来观察电池，我们是用电荷。这是一种独特的方法，绕过了科学家在用光对细胞成像时传统上面临的一些问题。虽然使用光的方法能够拍摄非常小的细胞的照片(在微米量级)，但纯粹的电子成像方法在它们可以“看到”多小的细胞方面是有限的。在我们的工作中，我们提高了设计用于拍摄细胞电子照片的“相机”的分辨率。我们通过使用与为几乎所有电脑和智能手机制造芯片相同的半导体技术制造相机来做到这一点。这项技术包含非常小的电子元件，可以检测电池内部和周围电荷的微小变化。当电池直接放置在芯片表面时，我们可以更准确地检测到这些微小的电荷变化，并形成细胞的图像。此外，我们不仅可以拍摄细胞的照片，还可以观察它们的移动、生长，甚至与周围其他细胞的交流。在这项提议中，我们开发了一种新型的半导体电路，对细胞进行成像。我们试图使这些成像电路更小、更快、更准确，这样我们就可以看到越来越小的细胞。除了制造新的电路，我们还开发了更好的方法，让活细胞与半导体表面相互作用。我们的工作开启了制造电荷电池相机的可能性，可以用作识别疾病的工具。一些细胞，如细菌，可以在表面形成非常薄的薄膜，如果触摸可能会使人生病。在医院，这尤其是一个问题，在那里，被细菌膜污染的医疗器械，如导管，可能会让患者病情加重。我们的长期目标之一是制造一种可以看到这些胶片并通知医院工作人员防止疾病传播的相机。为了实现我们的目标，我们将培训博士生、硕士和本科生设计能够使用电化学传感方法对细胞成像的半导体芯片。我们还将与细胞生长方面的专家技术人员合作，以便我们能够准确地测试我们制造的原型细胞相机。我们预计，我们开发的技术有朝一日将被整合到加拿大和世界各地的公司生产的各种医疗器械中。在短期内，我们相信我们的技术可以被生命科学研究人员用非传统的方式研究细胞，为细胞行为提供新的见解。

In the proposed program, we design semiconductor chips that can take pictures of living cells. However, we do not use light to look at cells, we use charge. This is a unique approach and gets around some of the issues scientists have traditionally faced when imaging cells with light. Although approaches using light are able to take pictures of very small cells (on the order of micrometres), purely electronic imaging methods are limited in how small a cell they can “see”.In our work, we improve the resolution of “cameras” designed to take electronic pictures of cells. We do this by building our camera with the same semiconductor technology as that used to make chips for virtually all computers and smartphones. This technology contains very small electronic components that can detect minute changes in the charge inside and surrounding a cell. We can more accurately detect these small changes in charge and form an image of the cell when the cell is placed directly on the surface of the chip. In addition, not only can we take pictures of cells, we can watch them as they move, grow, and even communicate with other cells around them.In this proposal, we develop new kinds of semiconductor circuits that image cells. We attempt to make these imaging circuits smaller, faster, and more accurate so that we can view progressively smaller cells. In addition to making new circuits, we develop better ways for live cells to interact with the surface of the semiconductor.Our work opens up the possibility of making charge-based cell cameras that can be used as a tool to identify diseases. Some cells, like bacteria, can form very thin films on surfaces, which could make people sick if touched. This is especially a problem in hospitals where a medical instrument, like a catheter, contaminated with a bacterial film could make a patient very ill. One of our long-term goals is to build a camera that could see these films and notify hospital staff to prevent illnesses from spreading.To achieve our goals, we will train doctoral, Master's, and undergraduate students to design semiconductor chips that can image cells using electrochemical sensing methods. We will also work with technicians who are experts in growing cells so that we can accurately test the prototype cell cameras we make. We expect that that technology we develop will one day be integrated into various medical instruments manufactured by companies in Canada and around the world. In the shorter term, we believe our technology could be used by life science researchers to study cells in non-traditional ways, providing new insights into cell behaviour.