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Science 25 March 2005:
Vol. 307. no. 5717, pp. 1942 - 1945
DOI: 10.1126/science.1109128
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Reports

Chemical Detection with a Single-Walled Carbon Nanotube Capacitor

E. S. Snow,* F. K. Perkins, E. J. Houser, S. C. Badescu, T. L. Reinecke

We show that the capacitance of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) is highly sensitive to a broad class of chemical vapors and that this transduction mechanism can form the basis for a fast, low-power sorption-based chemical sensor. In the presence of a dilute chemical vapor, molecular adsorbates are polarized by the fringing electric fields radiating from the surface of a SWNT electrode, which causes an increase in its capacitance. We use this effect to construct a high-performance chemical sensor by thinly coating the SWNTs with chemoselective materials that provide a large, class-specific gain to the capacitance response. Such SWNT chemicapacitors are fast, highly sensitive, and completely reversible.

Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC 20375, USA.

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: snow{at}bloch.nrl.navy.mil

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