Dresden 2014 – scientific programme

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TT: Fachverband Tiefe Temperaturen

TT 99: Graphene: Spintronics, Transistors, and Sensors (organized by HL)

TT 99.10: Talk

Thursday, April 3, 2014, 17:30–17:45, POT 081

Coupling of electrogenic cells to graphene devices — Michael Sejer Wismer, Felix Rolf, Damia Viana, •Martin Lottner, Lucas Hess, and Jose A. Garrido — Walter Schottky Institut - Technische Universität München, Am Coulombwall 4, 85748 Garching

In this contribution, we will demonstrate the electrical coupling between electrogenic cells and graphene-based solution-gated field effect transistors (SGFETs). To this end, HEK293 and HL1 cells were cultured on 8x8 arrays of graphene SGFETs with feature sizes of 10 mu x 20 mu. Graphene was grown by chemical vapour deposition (CVD) on copper foil and transferred to sapphire substrates, on which field effect transistors were fabricated using standard semiconductor technology. The devices show a typical maximum transconductance of >100 muS at 0.1 V drain-source voltage. This value is stable over months of storage. HEK293 cells were used to analyse the electrical coupling between cells and transistors. A model considering the distribution of ions within the cell transistor cleft and ion sensitivity of the graphene SGFETs fits the measured signals very well. Additionally, nano-transistors were defined by e-beam lithography, which allowed feature sizes down to 50 nm. With these nanoscale devices a signal-to-noise ratio of 2.5 could be obtained within single recordings of HL1 activity. Analysis of the measured ionic currents allowed to draw conclusions about local inhomogeneities of ion channel concentration within the membrane. Further, experiments for the stimulation of PC12 cells using arrays of graphene SGFET and graphene-based microelectrode arrays (MEAs) are under preparation.