Hand-Held Transistor Based Electrical and Multiplexed Chemical Sensing System

We describe a hand-held sensing system using a transistor based multiplexed platform and a detector that couples the electrochemical information wirelessly to a smartphone. The custom disposable platform exploits the ion-sensitive FET (ISFET) technology. Via simple surface modifications the design allows a broad range of analytes to be tested with low cost. We compared our read-out device to a commercial potentiometer using K+ as an example species analyte. The developed sensing system has a slightly better limit of detection and is notably less susceptible to external noise which is commonly observed with potentiometers. The designed platform is fabricated using standard electronic processes with gold surface and we used commercial discrete transistors as the transducing element. It can be mass produced with high yield and low cost. To circumvent the drift that typically occurs with modified solid state electrodes we incorporated a transducing layer between the electric conductor (gold pad) and the ionically conducting ion-selective membrane. The polyaniline doped with dinonylnaphtalene sulfonic acid (PANI-DNNSA) was used as a transducing layer for the first time. The PANI-DNNSA layer significantly reduces the drift of the electrodes compared to a configuration without the transducing layer. The system is easy to use with a transistor based detection that can be modified for a vast variety of existing potentiometric tests.