Arsenic contamination of groundwater remains a serious health concern in many areas of the world. Developing countries such as Bangladesh and Nepal are particularly affected because access to high quality water infrastructure is low. Since the 1970s, most water in these countries is sourced from shallow tube wells installed to reduce the spread of diseases associated with poor water hygiene. In this goal they were successful, however by the mid 1990s it became apparent that many of these wells were contaminated by arsenic and that these countries’ rural poor were being slowly poisoned. No simple, cheap, and reliable test for arsenic exists, and efforts to mitigate arsenic contamination have been severely limited by this over the past two decades. Government backed well-testing efforts using commercially available field kits have many issues with reliability, safety, rigour, and transparency, and have lost their urgency over the past decade, while the expensive field test kits remain out of the reach of most ordinary people in these areas. Synthetic Biology offers the technology to develop a new class of biosensor by exploiting bacteria’s natural ability to sense and respond to levels of arsenic considerably lower than commercially available kits which are based on analytical chemistry. In order to reach this goal, we must first develop our understanding of the natural response to arsenic in our chosen host, B. subtilis. Although we have a reasonably good qualitative understanding of the operon responsible for arsenic sensing, very little quantitative analysis has been carried out, and a robust system for ratiometric characterisation has not been established in the bacteria. In this work, a robust platform for rapid ratiometric characterisation is established in B. subtilis. A rigorous mathematical model of the ars operon is developed and analysed before being verified experimentally. This new knowledge is then used to explore synthetic permutations to the natural system aimed at improving the sensor properties of the system. Finally, a biological architecture for an easily tunable biosensor with good characteristics is recommended.

Wu, Kin Fai. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 88-91). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Abstract --- p.i / 槪要 --- p.ii / Acknowledgements --- p.iii / Table of Contents --- p.iv / List of Figures --- p.vi / List of Tables --- p.x / Chapter Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1 --- Motivation --- p.1 / Chapter 1.2 --- Outline of the Proposed Design --- p.2 / Chapter 1.3 --- Purposes of the Present Study --- p.2 / Chapter Chapter 2 --- Background and Literature Review --- p.4 / Chapter 2.1 --- Electrocardiogram --- p.4 / Chapter 2.2 --- Conventional ECG Measurement --- p.7 / Chapter 2.3 --- Heart Rate --- p.8 / Chapter 2.4 --- Heart Rate Variability --- p.9 / Chapter 2.5 --- Capacitive Sensing --- p.11 / Chapter 2.6 --- Review of ECG Monitoring System by Capacitive Sensing On a Sleeping Bed --- p.14 / Chapter Chapter 3 --- System Design and Implementation --- p.17 / Chapter 3.1 --- Hardware --- p.17 / Chapter 3.1.1 --- Bedsheet Sensor --- p.17 / Chapter 3.1.2 --- Pre-amplifier --- p.21 / Chapter 3.1.3 --- Measuring Device --- p.30 / Chapter 3.1.4 --- Power Supply & PCB Layout --- p.49 / Chapter 3.2 --- Software --- p.52 / Chapter 3.2.1 --- Detection of R Waves --- p.52 / Chapter 3.2.2 --- Tracking of HR & Mean RR Intervals --- p.55 / Chapter 3.2.3 --- Estimation of Signal-to-Noise Ratios --- p.56 / Chapter Chapter 4 --- Preliminary Tests on the Functionality of the Proposed System --- p.57 / Chapter 4.1 --- Test I - Test on the Arrangement of Electrodes --- p.57 / Chapter 4.1.1 --- Methods --- p.57 / Chapter 4.1.2 --- Results --- p.60 / Chapter 4.2 --- Test II - Test on the ECG Measurement of Subjects in Different Sleeping Postures --- p.64 / Chapter 4.2.1 --- Methods --- p.64 / Chapter 4.2.2 --- Results --- p.65 / Chapter Chapter 5 --- Experiments on the Performance of Continuous Monitoring of ECG and HR --- p.69 / Chapter 5.1 --- Experiment I - Experiment on the Reliability of the Proposed System for Continuous Monitoring of ECG and HR on Thirty Subjects --- p.69 / Chapter 5.1.1 --- Methods --- p.70 / Chapter 5.1.2 --- Results --- p.70 / Chapter 5.2 --- Experiment II - Experiment on the Feasibility of the Proposed System for Continuous Monitoring of ECG and HR on a Subject During an Eight-hour Sleep --- p.75 / Chapter 5.2.1 --- Materials --- p.76 / Chapter 5.2.2 --- Methods --- p.76 / Chapter 5.2.3 --- Results --- p.77 / Chapter Chapter 6 --- Discussions --- p.81 / Chapter 6.1 --- Selection of the Passband of the Proposed Circuit --- p.81 / Chapter 6.2 --- Arrangement of Electrodes on the Bedsheet --- p.82 / Chapter 6.3 --- Practical Design of Electrodes --- p.83 / Chapter 6.4 --- Performance of Continuous Monitoring of HR by Using the Proposed System --- p.84 / Chapter Chapter 7 --- Conclusion --- p.86 / References --- p.88

Chan, Chun Hung. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 77-84). / Abstracts in Chinese and English. / Acknowledgment: --- p.i / 摘要 --- p.ii / Abstract --- p.iv / List of Figure --- p.vi / List of Table --- p.viii / Content Page --- p.ix / Chapter Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1 --- The Difficulties --- p.1 / Chapter 1.2 --- The Solution --- p.2 / Chapter 1.3 --- Goal of the Present Work --- p.2 / Chapter Chapter 2 --- Background and Methodology --- p.3 / Chapter 2.1 --- Hypertension Situation and Problems Around the World --- p.3 / Chapter 2.1.1 --- Blood Pressure Variability (BPV) --- p.4 / Chapter 2.2 --- Blood Pressure Measuring Methods --- p.5 / Chapter 2.2.1 --- Traditional Blood Pressure Meters --- p.6 / Chapter 2.2.2 --- Limitation of Commercial Blood Pressure Meters --- p.7 / Chapter 2.2.3 --- Pulse-Transit-Time (PTT) Based Blood Pressure Measuring Watch --- p.7 / Chapter 2.3 --- Wearable Body Sensors Network / System --- p.8 / Chapter 2.4 --- Current Status of e-Textile Garment --- p.9 / Chapter 2.4.1 --- Blood Pressure Measurement in e-Textile Garment --- p.13 / Chapter 2.5 --- Wearable Intelligent Sensors and System for e-Health (WISSH) --- p.15 / Chapter 2.5.1 --- "Monitoring, Connection and Display" --- p.15 / Chapter 2.5.2 --- Treatment --- p.16 / Chapter 2.5.3 --- Alarming --- p.17 / Chapter Chapter 3 --- "A h-Shirt to Non-invasive, Continuous Monitoring of Arterial Blood Pressure" --- p.18 / Chapter 3.1 --- Design and Inner Structure of h-Shirt --- p.18 / Chapter 3.1.1 --- Choose of e-Textile Material --- p.21 / Chapter 3.1.2 --- Design of ECG Circuit --- p.23 / Chapter 3.1.3 --- Design of PPG Circuit --- p.26 / Chapter 3.2 --- Blood Pressure Estimation Using Pulse-Transit-Time Algorithm --- p.28 / Chapter 3.2.1 --- Principal --- p.28 / Chapter 3.2.2 --- Equations --- p.29 / Chapter 3.2.3 --- Calibration --- p.29 / Chapter 3.3 --- Performance Tests on h-Shirt --- p.30 / Chapter 3.3.1 --- Test I: BP Measurement Accuracy --- p.30 / Chapter 3.3.2 --- Test I: Procedure and Protocol --- p.30 / Chapter 3.3.3 --- Test I-Results --- p.31 / Chapter 3.3.4 --- Test II: Continuality BP Estimation Performance --- p.31 / Chapter 3.3.5 --- Test II - Experiment Procedure and Protocol --- p.32 / Chapter 3.3.6 --- Test II - Experiment Result --- p.33 / Chapter 3.3.7 --- Test II 一 Discussion --- p.43 / Chapter 3.4 --- Follow-up Tests on ECG Circuit --- p.47 / Chapter 3.4.1 --- Problems --- p.47 / Chapter 3.4.2 --- Assumptions --- p.48 / Chapter 3.4.3 --- Experiment Protocol and Setup --- p.48 / Chapter 3.4.4 --- Experiment Results --- p.53 / Chapter 3.4.5 --- Discussion --- p.56 / Chapter Chapter 4: --- Hybrid Body Sensor Network in h-Shirt --- p.59 / Chapter 4.1 --- A Hybrid Body Sensor Network --- p.59 / Chapter 4.2 --- Biological Channel Used in h-Shirt --- p.60 / Chapter 4.3 --- Tests of Bio-channel Performance --- p.62 / Chapter 4.3.1 --- Experiment Protocol --- p.62 / Chapter 4.3.2 --- Results --- p.62 / Chapter 4.4 --- Discussion and Conclusion --- p.63 / Chapter Chapter 5: --- Conclusion and Suggestions for Future Works --- p.66 / Chapter 5.1 --- Conclusion --- p.66 / Chapter 5.1.1 --- Structure of h-Shirt --- p.66 / Chapter 5.1.2 --- Blood Pressure Estimating Ability of h-Shirt --- p.67 / Chapter 5.1.3 --- Tests and Amendments on h-Shirt ECG Circuit --- p.67 / Chapter 5.1.4 --- Hybrid Body Sensor Network in h-Shirt --- p.67 / Chapter 5.2 --- Suggestions for Future Work --- p.68 / Chapter 5.2.1 --- Further Development of Bio-channel Biological Model --- p.68 / Chapter 5.2.2 --- Positioning and Motion Sensing with h-Shirt --- p.69 / Chapter 5.2.3 --- Implementation of Updated Advance Technology into h-Shirt --- p.69 / Appendix: Non-invasive BP Measuring Device - Finometer --- p.71 / Reference: --- p.77

This thesis treats the development of an integrated optical sensor array. The sensors are slot-waveguide ring resonators, integrated with on-chip surface grating couplers and light splitters, for alignment tolerant, real-time, refractive index sensing, and label-free biosensing. The work includes: the design of components and system layouts, the development of fabrication methods, the fabrication of sensor chips, the characterization of the chips, and the development of physical system models for accurate extraction of resonance wavelengths in measured spectra. The main scientific achievements include: The evaluation of a novel type of nano-structured optical waveguide for biochemical sensing. The realization of an array of such slot-waveguide sensors, integrated with microfluidic sample handling, for multiplex assays. The first study of the thermal behavior of slot-waveguide sensors and the discovery of unique temperature compensation capabilities. From an application perspective, the use of alignment tolerant surface gratings to couple light into the optical chip enables quick replacement of cartridges in the read-out instrument. Furthermore, the fabrication sequence avoids polishing of individual chips, and thus ensures that the cost benefits of silicon batch micro-fabrication can be leveraged in mass production. The high sensitivity of the slot waveguide resonators, combined with on-chip referencing and physical modeling, yields low limits of detection. The obtained volume refractive index detection limit of 5 × 10−6 refractive index units (RIU), and the surface mass density detection limit of 0.9 pg/mm2, shows that performance comparable to that of commercial non-integrated surface plasmon resonance sensors, made from bulk optical components, canbe achieved in a compact cartridge. / Qc20100715 / SABIO

In this thesis, a systematic study has been carried out on the synthesis, characterization and device fabrication of piezoelectric ZnO nanstructures. The achieved results are composed of the following four parts. Firstly, through a systematic investigation on the Sn-catalyzed ZnO nanostructure, an improved understanding of the chemical and physical process occurring during the growth of hierarchical nanostructures has been achieved. Decomposed Sn from SnO2 has been successfully demonstrated and proved to be an effective catalyst guiding the growth of not only aligned ZnO nanowires, but also the hierarchical nanowire-nanoribbon junction arrays and nanopropeller arrays. During the vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) catalyzing growth process at high temperature, Sn in the liquid state has been proved to be able to guide the growth of nanowires and nanoribbons in terms of growth directions, side facets, and crystallographic interfaces between Sn and ZnO nanostructures. Secondly, using pure ZnO as the only source material, by precisely tuning and controlling the growth kinetics, a variety of hierarchical polar surface dominated nanostructures have been achieved, such as single crystal nanorings, nanobows, nanosprings and superlattice nanohelices. High yield synthesis of ZnO nanosprings over 50% has been successfully obtained by mainly controlling the pre-pumping level associated with the partial pressure of residual oxygen during the vapor-solid growth process. The rigid superlattice nanohelices of ZnO have been discovered, which is a result of minimization of the electrostatic energy induced by polar surfaces. The formation process of the nanohelix has been systematically characterized. Thirdly, two new strategies have been successfully developed for fabricating ZnO quantum dots and synthesis of ZnO nanodiskettes and nanotubes. The formation process is based on a common concept of self-assembly. Finally, a series of devices and applications studies based on several piezoelectric ZnO nanostructures, such as nanobelts, nanopropellers and nanohelices, have been carried out utilizing the electro-mechanical resonance, bio-surface functionalization, devices fabrication and electrical characterization. Individual nanobelt and nanohelix based nanodevices have been successfully fabricated for applications in chemical and biological sensing. The study opens a few new areas in oxide nanostructures and applications.

In this study, we introduce novel, truly non-ionic hydrogen-bonded layer-by-layer (LbL) coatings for cell surface engineering capable of long-term support of cell function. Utilizing the LbL technique imparts the ability to tailor membrane permeability, which is of particular importance for encapsulation of living cells as cell viability critically depends on the diffusion of nutrients through the artificial polymer membrane. Ultrathin, permeable polymer membranes are constructed on living cells without a cationic pre-layer, which is usually employed to increase the stability of LbL coatings. In the absence of the cytotoxic PEI pre-layer, viability of encapsulated cells drastically increases to 94%, as compared to 20-50% in electrostatically-bonded shells. Engineering surfaces of living cells with natural or synthetic compounds can mediate intercellular communication, render the cells less sensitive to environmental changes, and provide a protective barrier from hostile agents. Surface engineered cells show great potential for biomedical applications, including biomimetics, biosensing, enhancing biocompatibility of implantable materials, and may represent an important step toward construction of an artificial cell.

abstract: Three-dimensional (3D) inductors with square, hexagonal and octagonal geometries have been designed and simulated in ANSYS HFSS. The inductors have been designed on Silicon substrate with through-hole via with different width, spacing and thickness. Spice modeling has been done in Agilent ADS and comparison has been made with results of custom excel based calculator and HFSS simulation results. Single ended quality factor was measured as 12.97 and differential ended quality factor was measured as 15.96 at a maximum operational frequency of 3.65GHz. The single ended and differential inductance was measured as 2.98nH and 2.88nH respectively at this frequency. Based on results a symmetric octagonal inductor design has been recommended to be used for application in RF biosensing. A system design has been proposed based on use of this inductor and principle of inductive sensing using magnetic labeling. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.S. Electrical Engineering 2012

Abstract This thesis is a study of the odour responses of insect olfactory (or odorant) receptor neurons (ORN) of blowfly (Calliphora vicina), mosquito (Aedes communis), fruitflies (Drosophila melanogaster and D. virilis) and large pine weevil (Hylobius abietis). A power-law dependence (similar to Stevens' law in psychophysics) was obtained for the action potential rate of ORN responses vs. odour concentration in measurements with metal microelectrodes from blowfly ORNs and an analysis system was developed for the extracellularily recorded action potentials (or nerve pulses). Odour exposure sequences were used to study action potential rates quantitatively as a function of odour concentration in air exposure. For an odour exposure sequence, a known initial amount of the odour compound in a filter paper inside a Pasteur pipette at the beginning of repeated exposures caused a gradual dilution of the odour concentration in the exposure sequence. The concentration at each exposure was calculated according to the discrete multiple headspace extraction and dilution (DMHED) method. The estimated odour concentration was assumed to obey in the method an exponential law with respect to the exposure number in the sequence. Despite that many uncontrollable parameters remain for measuring quantitatively the characteristics of the ORNs, the results obtained, e.g., sensitivity, specificity, adaptability, and the power-law realation are both biologically and technically very interesting. A time-to-voltage converter (TVC) was utilized for the response analysis in determining action potential intervals originating from a single ORN. A precision analysis of TVC was also performed. With the mosquito (Aedes communis), fruitflies (Drosophila melanogaster and D. virilis) and large pine weevil (Hylobius abietis) antennae were tested for inhibitory and excitatory effects to find out repellents and attractants. Human sweat was found to cause strong stimulus exposure in the responses of the mosquito ORNs and Neutroil® caused inhibitory responses in pine weevil ORNs, respectively. The power-law exponents for blowfly ORNs were about 0.19 in the case of 1-hexanol (HX), 0.065 in the case of 1,4-diaminobutane (14DAB) and 0.32 in the case of butyric acid (BA). The corresponding Stevens' law exponent values 0.39 and 0.33 have been reported for HX and BA, respectively, by Patte et al. (1975).

Les Plasmons de surface à l’interface d’un métal et d’un diélectrique sont des oscillations collectives des électrons libres. Pour une interface plane, les plasmons se manifestent comme des champs électromagnétiques évanescents, confinée à quelques centaines de nanomètres de la surface métallique et se propagent le long de l'interface. Ce mode plasmonique, appelé plasmon propagatif de surface (PSP), est un mode fondamental. D’autres modes fondamentaux, non-propagatifs, sont appelé plasmons localisés (LSP) et apparaissent dans les nano-particules métalliques. Dans ce travail, nous avons calculé analytiquement la polarisabilité de géométries métalliques complexes et les résultats obtenus permettent d’expliquer les conditions de résonance des différents modes plasmoniques.Parmi les divers modes plasmoniques, plusieurs modes fondamentaux ont été étudiés en détail et décrits par une formulation analytique. Tout d’abord, dans un réseau binaire de lignes métalliques, des plasmons propagatifs confinés par la dimension finie des lignes sont générés. Ce mode plasmonique est appelé plasmons propagatifs confinée (CPP). D’autre part, dans des réseaux périodiques de nano-particules métalliques, déposées sur un film métallique, des modes de Bragg (BM) sont excités par la diffraction des PSP. De plus, dans de telles structures, un couplage harmonique entre les LSP des nano-particules et le PSP du film métallique sous-jacent se traduit par l’apparition d’un mode hybride (HLP). Les caractéristiques de ce mode hybride pour un réseau de nano-cylindres métalliques sur un film métallique sont présentées en détails, en particulier son intérêt en bio-détection.L'effet du milieu diélectrique environnant sur les modes plasmoniques est utilisé dans les détecteurs basés sur la résonance des plasmons de surface (SPR). Ces systèmes mesurent le décalage de la résonance d’un mode plasmonique, qui est fonction de l’indice de réfraction du milieu diélectrique. L’un des buts de ce travail est d'optimiser les détecteurs SPR pour des expériences typiques sondes – cibles où les molécules sonde sont greffées à la surface du capteur. Nous avons montré que par une fonctionnalisation sélective de la surface métallique, une amélioration de la performance de détection peut être obtenue en terme de quantité de molécules cibles détectable. L'amélioration de champ proche joue aussi un rôle majeur dans les techniques de diffusion Raman exaltée de surface (SERS). La présence de certains des modes plasmoniques étudiés dans les substrats nano-structurés permet d’augmenter significativement l'intensité du signal SERS.Pour réaliser ce travail, des méthodes numériques adaptées à la géométrie particulière des structures étudiées ont été développés pour calculer les distributions des champs proches et lointains dans ces structures. Les caractéristiques de ces modes plasmoniques ont été mesurés expérimentalement et leurs performances en détection SPR ont été démontrées en utilisant une configuration basée sur une interrogation angulo-spectrale en configuration de Kretschmann. Des expériences de SERS ont également été réalisées en collaboration avec le CSPBAT à Paris 13. Les différentes structures ont été fabriquées par lithographie électronique à l’IEF à Paris 11. Les résultats expérimentaux concordent avec les résultats numériques et analytiques.Cette description détaillée des modes plasmoniques offre une compréhension plus complète du phénomène de résonance des plasmons de surface dans les nanostructures métalliques et permet d’optimiser les structures selon l’application souhaitée. Le modèle présenté dans ce travail est relativement général et peut être utilisé pour décrire les propriétés électromagnétiques de différentes géométries et configurations expérimentales. De la représentation complète des modes plasmoniques, différents aspects des interactions photons-plasmons peuvent ainsi être étudiés. / The surface plasmons on metallic surfaces are excited by the collective oscillations of free electrons. They satisfy certain resonance conditions and their dispersion can be considered as modes of the system. The plasmons at uniform metal-dielectric interfaces manifest as evanescent electromagnetic (EM) fields confined to a few hundreds of nanometers from the metallic surface and propagate along the interface. This mode is called the Propagating surface plasmon (PSP) and is a fundamental plasmonic mode. The other fundamental modes, which are non-propagative, results from collective oscillations of free electrons on curved surfaces of metallic nano-particles. They are called localized surface plasmon (LSP) modes. We have shown that the polarizability of complex geometries with an underlying substrate can be calculated analytically and the results obtained closely approximate the resonance conditions for such geometries.In this work, various other plasmonic modes originating from the two fundamental modes were studied in details and described by their corresponding analytical formulation. In a binary metallic arrays on glass substrate, plasmonic modes are excited by diffraction orders, called the Wood-Rayleigh modes (WRM). In metallic strips the PSP is confined by the finite edges of the strips and propagate along the length of the strips, called the confined propagating plasmons (CPP).For arrays of metallic nano-particles on a metallic film, the Bragg modes (BM) are excited by diffraction of the PSP. In such structures the LSP of the nano-particles and the PSP of the film can undergo a harmonic coupling to give rise to the hybrid lattice plasmon (HLP). The characteristics of the HLP mode for an array of metallic nano-cylinders on a metallic film is presented in details.The effect of the surrounding medium on the plasmonic modes is used in surface plasmon resonance (SPR) detectors which probe the shift in resonance condition of the modes. Such shift is dependent on the intrinsic dispersion of the modes. The aim of this work is to optimize the SPR detectors for affinity biosensing where probe and analyte molecules are bound to the metallic surface. We have shown that by selective functionalization of the metallic biochip surface, an enhancement of the performance of such detection can be achieved in terms of the amount of analyte used. Also the near field enhancement plays a major role in surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS). We have shown that the presence of certain modes in the system can enhance the recorded SERS intensity.Rigorous numerical methods, adapted to the particular geometry under study, were developed to compute the near and far field characteristics of different structures. The experimental excitation of the modes and their application in SPR detection was demonstrated using a setup based on a spectral scanning modality operating in the Kretschmann configuration. The various structures were fabricated on a biochip using e-beam lithography at IEF, University Paris Sud and the reflectivity dispersion from the biochip was recorded. Such experimental results were shown to be in close agreement with the theoretical results. SERS experiments were carried out in collaboration with CSPBAT at University Paris 13 and the results were seen to fit closely the theoretically predicted trends.Such detailed description of plasmonic modes can offer a complete understanding of the surface plasmon resonance phenomenon in metallic structures and be optimized as per required for various applications. The theories presented in this work can be used to effectively describe the EM properties of different geometries and experimental configurations. From a comprehensive representation of plasmonic modes, different aspects of the photon-plasmon interactions can thus be elucidated.

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