A novel PDMS micro membrane biosensor based on the analysis of surface stress.

The biological and medical application of biosensors is more and more important with the development of technology and society. Detection of cells and biological molecules utilizing biosensors based on the analysis of surface stress would facilitate inexpensive and high-throughput test and diagnosis. This paper presents a biocompatible surface stress-based polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) micro membrane biosensor. Each biosensor chip consists of two available PDMS micro membranes, one acts as active membrane and the other as reference. Biosensors were functionalized using different functional materials respectively: MUA (11 Mercapto 1 undecanoicacid), MUO (11 Mercapto 1 undecanol) and DOT (Dodecane thiol). Two biosensor test systems were built based on a white light interferometer and a fiber optic interferometer respectively. Finally, testing experiments using Escherichia coli (E. coli) were performed based on the biosensor test systems we built. The results of the experiments showed that the MUA is a better functional material to functionalize the biosensor membranes than MUO and DOT for E. coli detection, some properties of E. coli, such as healthily living and dead status, can be analyzed based on the PDMS micro membrane biosensors.