Field Effect Transistors Based on Polycyclic Aromatic
Hydrocarbons for the Detection and Classification of Volatile Organic
Compounds
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Abstract
We show that polycyclic aromatic
hydrocarbon (PAH) based field effect transistor (FET) arrays can serve
as excellent chemical sensors for the detection of volatile organic
compounds (VOCs) under confounding humidity conditions. Using these
sensors, w/o complementary pattern recognition methods, we study the
ability of PAH-FET(s) to: (i) discriminate between aromatic and non-aromatic
VOCs; (ii) distinguish polar and non-polar non-aromatic compounds;
and to (iii) identify specific VOCs within the subgroups (i.e., aromatic
compounds, polar non-aromatic compounds, non-polar non-aromatic compounds).
We further study the effect of water vapor on the sensor array’s
discriminative ability and derive patterns that are stable when exposed
to different constant values of background humidity. Patterns based
on different independent electronic features from an array of PAH-FETs
may bring us one step closer to creating a unique fingerprint for
individual VOCs in real-world applications in atmospheres with varying
levels of humidity