NEMS Inertial Image · Inertial Imaging with Nanoelectromechanical Systems
FP7 — People (Marie Curie Actions)
- Duration
- 2014-03-01 → 2018-02-28
- EU contribution
- €100,000
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MC-CIG
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.
Results in brief
Inertial Imaging with Nanoelectromechanical Systems
Nanoelectromechanical Systems (NEMS) are electronically controllable, mechanical structures engineered at the nano-scale. Due to their small size and large vibration frequencies, they can be used as high-performance sensors: for instance, NEMS sensors working at high-vacuum and low-temperature can measure the mass of single molecules. It was shown that inertial NEMS sensors can provide further multi-dimensional characterization: in addition to the molecular weight, spatial information of an analyte, such as its size and shape, can be extracted by using higher order modes of a mechanical sensor (Hanay, M. S., et Al., Nature Nanotechnol., 10, 2015, pp 339−344). NEMS sensors with the ability to resolve both the mass and shape of analyte molecules offer unprecedented, multi-dimensional sensing modalities. In this project, multimodal NEMS devices have been fabricated and transduced using thermo-elastic actuation and piezo-resistive detection. Four-mode simultaneous frequency tracking has been accomplished by parallel phase-locked loops. Different analytes, 20-nm gold nanoparticles and centrioles, have been detected by the NEMS device one by one. By using multi-mode detection algorithms mass, position as well as stiffness for the gold nanoparticles and standard deviation of the size for the centrioles have been calculated. Two-dimensional NEMS resonators, in the form of 100-nm Silicon Nitride membranes, with integrated metallic electrodes have also been fabricated in the context of the project. Moreover, the perturbations on the mode shape of NEMS resonators due to analyte adsorption have been quantified. During the implementation of the NEMS Inertial Imaging project, the electromagnetic analogue of the same technique was discovered by the researcher. Proof-of-principle demonstration of the electromagnetic analogue was implemented using microwave resonant sensors to size and locate microdroplets and human cells passing through an underlying microfluidic channel. The extension of this electromagnetic analogue into multiple modes has been very recently supported by an ERC Starting Grant, just as the Marie Curie CIG project drew an end. The project has supported the fellow in establishing a NEMS laboratory in Turkey and developing research networks in Europe. Several junior researchers have been trained in the context of the project, some of whom now continue their research careers in the USA and Europe. The project is expected to have a long-term contribution to the health-care and environmental protection efforts by contributing to low-cost, high-performance sensor technology that can characterize biomolecular samples and particulate pollution. The project website is: https://www.nems.me/marie-curie-cig-project
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
Nano-electromechanical Systems (NEMS) are extremely sensitive detectors of physical parameters. In recent years, the applications of NEMS in mass sensing have gained importance through demonstrations of mass sensitivities at the atomic level and mass measurements of single protein molecules. These demonstrations show that is possible to perform biochemical analysis through NEMS mass measurements (NEMS Mass Spectrometry) especially for physiologically important large molecules and biostructures. The NEMS literature so far has always treated these large molecules as point-particles; however considering the miniaturization trend of NEMS and the significant size of targeted large molecules, this assumption is getting less applicable for experiments. In this project, we demonstrate how we can theoretically and experimentally measure the total mass of an arbitrary mass distribution on NEMS through simultaneous measurements of multiple modes. Furthermore we show that this method can be used to obtain important spatial information about the measured molecule, such as its average position, the variance of its density distribution, the skewness of the molecule etc. This extra characterization modality expands the capabilities of NEMS devices: one can obtain, for instance, the effective density of the sample being measured by combining mass and extent (variance) information. With the proposed technique it is possible to obtain an approximate image of an adsorbed molecule by reconstructing the density profile using the measured moments of the distribution. In the project, multimodal NEMS devices will be fabricated, electronic and vacuum systems to perform the measurements will be constructed and up to the third moment (mass, position, variance and skewness) of different analytes (nanoparticles and biomolecules) will be obtained. The project will be the first step for the development of a novel, powerful NEMS sensing tool and facilitate the integration process of the researcher.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- BILKENT UNIVERSITESI VAKIF · Bilkent AnkaraCoordinatorTürkiye
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union