Investigation of the Effect of Native Oxide Layer on Performance of Interdigitated Impedance-Based Silicon Biochemical Sensors

Chemical and biological detection using Electrochemistry Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS) highly depends on the electrical characteristics of the electrodes used in the measurement process. In this work, the effect of surface coating on behavior of interdigitated impedance-based biochemical sensors is studied. Two interdigitated sensors with the same geometry and different electrode materials are fabricated using a standard process. One electrode is made of gold and the other electrode is made of polycrystalline silicon covered with a thin layer of native silicon dioxide. Different concentrations of di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP) in water are used and the Nyquist responses of the two sensors exposed to these solutions are obtained. The measurement results show that at high frequency both sensors form double-layer capacitance values on their electrode surfaces, however, the silicon sensor has a much lower double-layer capacitance values, because formation of oxide layer adds to the gap between charges at the interface of the electrode and the solution. Moreover, comparing the low frequency regions of the Nyquist plots for two sensors shows that the presence of oxide layer affects the Warburg effect and the charge diffusion near the surface of the electrode, creating an extra capacitive element in series with the diffusion effect. The results of this work may be extended to other interdigitated biochemical sensors that may have other sources of contamination on their surfaces.