| AVS 57th International Symposium & Exhibition | |
| Biomaterial Interfaces | Thursday Sessions |
| Session BI-ThP |
| Session: | Biomaterial Interfaces Poster Session |
| Presenter: | C. Pederzolli, Center for Materials and Microsystems - FBK, Italy |
| Authors: | L. Pasquardini, Center for Materials and Microsystems - FBK, Italy M. Benetti, University of Trento, Italy L. Lunelli, Center for Materials and Microsystems - FBK, Italy D. Iori, University of Trento, Italy L. Pancheri, Center for Materials and Microsystems - FBK, Italy F. Borghetti, Center for Materials and Microsystems - FBK, Italy L. Gonzo, Center for Materials and Microsystems - FBK, Italy G.F. Dalla Betta, University of Trento, Italy D. Stoppa, Center for Materials and Microsystems - FBK, Italy C. Pederzolli, Center for Materials and Microsystems - FBK, Italy |
| Correspondent: | Click to Email |
There is a high demand for convenient methodologies for detecting and measuring the levels of specific proteins in biological samples because their detection, identification and quantification can be very complex, expensive and time consuming. Biosensors are interesting tools offering certain operational advantages over standard photometric methods, especially with respect to sensibility, duration, ease-of-use, cost, simplicity and portability. Regarding this research field we are developing a monolithic silicon biochip suitable for detecting traces of proteins in biological fluids that are not detected by conventional immunoassays. Particularly in this contribute we discuss the performances of SPAD (Single-Photon Avalanche Diode) detector arrays fabricated in CMOS technology utilized within a lab-on-chip system consisting of a micro-reactor (MR) array for bioaffinity assays based on fluorescence markers. In a typical fluorescence lifetime experiment a pulsed laser is used to excite the fluorescent dyes and the emitted light is revealed by means of high sensitivity detectors. The utilized SPAD detector module, having a total area of 600 x 900 μm2 per MR, can be arranged to build a small pixel array to be directly coupled to the MRs. No emission filters are needed, since the ultra-short laser pulse is cut off in the time domain. Every module consists of a 10x10-SPAD sub-array, where each SPAD cell is equipped with dedicated active quenching and recharging circuit. A memory has also been implemented in order to enable only low dark count rate (DCR) SPADs, so that a total DCR of about 100kHz can be achieved for the whole photosensitive area. Two time-windows have been implemented in this architecture, with a time width that can be set within the range 500ps-10ns with a resolution of 500ps.