Silica Nanowires: Growth, Integration, and Sensing Applications.
This review (with 129 refs.) gives an overview on how the integration of silica nanowires (NWs) into micro-scale devices has resulted, in recent years, in simple yet robust nano-instrumentation with improved performance in targeted application areas such as sensing. This has been achieved by the use of appropriate techniques such as di-electrophoresis and direct vapor-liquid-growth phenomena, to restrict the growth of NWs to site-specific locations. This also has eliminated the need for post-growth processing and enables nanostructures to be placed on pre-patterned substrates. Various kinds of NWs have been investigated to determine how their physical and chemical properties can be tuned for integration into sensing structures. NWs integrated onto interdigitated micro-electrodes have been applied to the determination of gases and biomarkers. The technique of directly growing NWs eliminates the need for their physical transfer and thus preserves their structure and performance, and further reduces the costs of fabrication. The biocompatibility of NWs also has been studied with respect to possible biological applications. This review addresses the challenges in growth and integration of NWs to understand related mechanism on biological contact or gas exposure and sensing performance for personalized health and environmental monitoring.
Department of Immunology, College of medicine, Florida International University, Miami, FL-33199 USA.
Ajeet
A
Kaushik
Bio-MEMS and Microsystems Laboratory, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Florida International University, Miami, FL-33174, USA ; Department of Physics, Panjab University, Chandigarh-160014, India.
Rajesh
R
Kumar
Bio-MEMS and Microsystems Laboratory, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Florida International University, Miami, FL-33174, USA.
Eric
E
Huey
Bio-MEMS and Microsystems Laboratory, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Florida International University, Miami, FL-33174, USA.
Shekhar
S
Bhansali
Department of Immunology, College of medicine, Florida International University, Miami, FL-33199 USA ; Department of Surgery, Cleveland Clinic, Weston, FL-33331, USA.
Narayana
N
Nair
Department of Immunology, College of medicine, Florida International University, Miami, FL-33199 USA.
Madhavan
M
Nanir
Nanowires; Silica Nanowires Growth & Integration; Silica Nanowires for Sensing Applications