Effect of oxygen plasma treatment on horizontally aligned carbon nanotube thin film as pH-sensing membrane of extended-gate field-effect transistor

The high-performance pH-sensing membrane of extended-gate field-effect transistors (EGFET) composed of high-conductivity horizontally aligned carbon nanotube thin films (HACNTFs) after oxygen plasma treatment is successfully demonstrated. The 10-µm-wide catalytic metal lines with 60 µm interspace produced CNT vertical plates, and the plates were mechanically pulled down and densified to form HACNTFs. A large amount of oxygen-containing functional groups are decorated on the CNTs after the oxygen plasma treatment. These functional groups act as the sensing sites and respond to the H+ or OH− ions in solutions with different pH values. Therefore, these functionalized HACNTFs as pH-EGFET-sensing membranes can achieve a high voltage sensitivity of 40 mV/pH and high current sensitivity of 0.78 µA1/2/pH. Moreover, large linearity of 0.998 is measured in a wide sensing range from pH 1 to 13. These results reveal that the oxygen plasma treatment is an effective way to improve the CNT-sensing characteristics in pH-EGFET sensors.