| Progress Toward Carbon-Nanotube Arrays for Probing Cells |
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| Air Force Research Laboratory, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio | |
| Jan 31 2008 | |
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Advertisement: The most significant accomplishment of the research effort thus far, prompted by the abandonment of CVD, was development of a process for depositing presynthesized SWNTs in the vias. In an experiment to demonstrate the feasibility of this process, examination by scanning electron microscopy revealed that all of the vias were only partially filled with SWNTs, and each of a significant number of vias contained only one SWNT (or a small bundle of SWNTs). The presence of SWNTs was verified by use of micro- Raman spectroscopy: the Raman spectra from selected areas containing vias matched those of pristine SWNTs used for the deposition. Finite-element modeling of the deposition process was performed to show that it should be possible to control both the number and placement of the SWNTs; this finding has broad implications for numerous potential applications in which SWNTs could be used. A potential further benefit of the deposition of presynthesized SWNTs is that the SWNTs could be sorted according to their electrical properties, prior to deposition, so that only SWNTs having desired properties would be deposited. For example, metallic SWNTs could be separated from semiconducting SWNTs, and semiconducting SWNTs could be further sorted into narrow bandgap ranges suitable for specific applications. Notwithstanding the promise of the deposition-of-presynthesized-SWNTs approach, there is still significant risk associated with fabrication and with measurement of cell signaling events. Problems of passivating deposited SWNTs, functionalization of SWNTs for specific applications, defining measurement requirements, and understanding interactions of SWNTs with cells during measurements have yet to be solved. The risk of this research may be justified by the potential for contributing to understanding of cellular dynamics and thereby contributing to medical advances. This work was done by Reginald, C. Farrow of New Jersey Institute of Technology for the Air Force Research Laboratory. This Brief includes a Technical Support Package (TSP).
Progress Toward Carbon-Nanotube Arrays for Probing Cells (reference AFRL-0047) is currently available for download from the TSP library. Login first to download.
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