SBIR Phase I: Encased Cantilevers for Ultra-Sensitive Force and Mass Sensing in Liquids

SBIR 第一阶段：用于液体中超灵敏力和质量传感的封装悬臂

• 批准号: 1416590
• 负责人: Dominik Ziegler
• 金额: $ 14.98万
• 依托单位: Scuba Probe Technologies
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2014
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2014-07-01 至 2015-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1416590&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: SBIR; Phase; Encased; Cantilevers; Ultra

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project will develop a novel, low-cost fabrication process and a testing tool for encased Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) cantilevers. The project will lead to a significant reduction in fabrication costs and improvement in manufacturability of this revolutionary encased cantilever technology, enabling widespread adoption for liquid AFM experiments and biosensors. The market for liquid AFM probes alone is approximately $50 million, and the new scientific capabilities enabled by these probes could lead to even greater impact. Encased cantilevers will lead to significant improvements in diverse fields including health, technology, energy, and education. The knowledge gained from enhanced resolution of protein structures will lead to new therapeutics and implants. In-situ imaging of energy storage materials will advance the engineering of batteries and supercapacitors for next generation mobile devices, transportation, and grid storage. Characterization of mineral, hydrocarbon, and brine interfaces will lead to enhanced oil and gas recovery. These encased cantilevers may become effective tools for low-concentration biomarker detection, providing early warnings and preventing disease. Finally, the novel process to be developed may provide breakthroughs in the fabrication of device architectures for other micro-electromechanical (MEMS) devices and applications. AFM operation in liquid has more than an order of magnitude lower sensitivity versus working in air, leading to loss of resolution and inferior discernment of surface properties. This problem is solved by introducing engineered cantilevers which keep the resonator dry using a hydrophobic encasement that traps an air bubble around the cantilever. The specific technical objectives aim to reduce fabrication cost by 1) replacing a serial and expensive Focused Ion Beam (FIB) milling step with an innovative and novel parallel fabrication technique and 2) by fabricating a testing platform to characterize the performance of fabricated devices semi-automatically. The novel fabrication process will enable selective removal of the encasement material at the probe apex of many probes in parallel and the testing platform will provide frequency and quality factor measurements for many cantilevers. Successful completion of Phase I will result in a scalable fabrication and characterization process for encased cantilevers.

这项小型企业创新研究（SBIR）I期项目将开发一种新颖的低成本制造工艺，并用于包含原子力显微镜（AFM）悬臂的测试工具。该项目将大大降低制造成本，并提高这种革命性的包裹的悬臂技术，从而为液体AFM实验和生物传感器提供广泛的采用。仅液体AFM探针市场约为5000万美元，这些探针实现的新科学能力可能会导致更大的影响。包裹的悬臂将导致在包括健康，技术，能源和教育在内的各个领域的重大改进。从增强蛋白质结构的分辨率中获得的知识将导致新的治疗剂和植入物。储能材料的原位成像将推动电池和超级电容器的工程，用于下一代移动设备，运输和电网存储。矿物质，碳氢化合物和盐水界面的表征将导致石油和天然气恢复增强。这些包裹的悬臂可能会成为低浓度生物标志物检测的有效工具，提供早期警告和预防疾病。最后，要开发的新过程可能会在为其他微电动机械（MEMS）设备和应用的设备架构制造方面提供突破。液体中的AFM操作的灵敏度比在空气中工作的敏感性低于较低的范围，从而导致表面特性的分辨率损失和较低的识别。通过引入工程的悬臂来解决此问题，这些悬臂可以使用疏水包膜使谐振器保持干燥，从而使悬臂周围的气泡捕获气泡。特定的技术目标旨在通过1）用创新和新颖的并行制造技术替换连续且昂贵的离子光束（FIB）铣削步骤，以及2）通过制造测试平台来表征制造设备的性能半自动。新颖的制造过程将在许多探针的探针顶点的探针顶点的选择性去除，并并联许多探针，测试平台将为许多悬臂提供频率和质量因子测量。成功完成阶段将为包裹的悬臂提供可扩展的制造和表征过程。