GOLD THIOLATE AND PHOTOCHEMICALLY FUNCTIONALIZED MICROCANTILEVERS USING MOLECULAR RECOGNITION AGENTS

摘要

Highly sensitive sensor plarforms for the detection of specific reagents, suchas chromate, gasoline and biological species, using microcantilevers and othermicroelectromechanical systems (MEMS) whose surfaces have been modified withphotochemically attached organic monolayers, such as self-assembled monolayers(SAM), or gold-thiol surface linkage are taught. The microcantilever sensorsuse photochemical hydrosilylation to modify silicon surfaces and gold-thiolchemistry to modify metallic surfaces thereby enabling individualmicrocantilevers in multicantilever array chips to be modified separately.Terminal vinyl substituted hydrocarbons with a variety of molecularrecognition sites can be attached to the surface of silicon via thephotochemical hydrosilylation process. By focusing the activating UV lightsequentially on selected silicon or silicon nitride hydrogen terminatedsurfaces and soaking or spotting selected metallic surfaces with organicthiols, sulfides, or disulfides, the microcantilevers are funtionalized. Thedevice and photochemical method are intended to be integrated into systems fordetecting specific agents including chromate groundwater contamination,gasoline, and biological species.