A CMOS sensor for rapid testing of pathogen susceptibility to pore-forming antibiotics

An integrated CMOS chip is implemented in 0.13μm technology that detects the efficacy of pore-forming antibiotics on bacterial samples in 10 minutes. The chip has been tested using two strains of E. coli and polymyxin B as the model antibiotic. An array of potassium-sensitive ISFETs and their readout circuits are integrated on the CMOS chip and a potassium-sensitive membrane is directly attached to the top metal electrodes, to measure potassium efflux from the affected bacterial cells.