Detection of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) with polymer coated cantilevers

摘要

Changes in the resonance frequency of polymer coated cantilevers due to gas absorption can be used as a detection mechanism for gases. An additional mass loading of the cantilever results in a decrease of the resonance frequency. In this approach we prepared cantilevers bsed on micromachined Si wafers and used polydimethlsiloxane (PDMS) as polymeric prtotype coating. PDMS is known to exhibit high selectivity to volatile organic compounds (VOCs). By using the first higher resonance mode we found with our configuration a sensitivity of-0.049Hz/ppm for n-octane.