Calixarene-coated nanoparticle gold films for chemical recognition system

Nanoparticle metal films functionalized with calixarenes offer a novel technology for highly effective, technologically feasible, small and cheap chemical gas sensors. We have designed, manufactured and measured the performance of chemical gas sensor elements, where molecular absorption by the calixarene layer controls the electrical conductivity of a nanoparticle gold film evaporated on a dielectric substrate. The sensors were exposed to several alcohol and water vapors and the dynamic sensor responses were analyzed. Resistance variation of the measured samples achieves 10%. Current-voltage curves, recovery characteristics and temperature dependencies of the sensor elements were investigated. Degradation of the sensitivity due to the aging effect was observed. We show that differences in the sensor recovery time, as well as concavity or convexity of the leading edge of the sensor transition curve could be used as additional information parameters for chemical recognition system.