Design and Characterization of a Passive Wireless DNA Sensor

This paper presents a concept for a passive wireless DNA sensing platform that exploits a multidisciplinary area, synthesizing the conventional DNA capacitive sensing mechanism and the surface-based conformational characterization throughout DNA immobilization and hybridization. The resonant frequency shift, caused by the change of capacitance throughout DNA immobilization and hybridization and occurring on top of an interdigital capacitor, is monitored by means of an impedance analyzer. 32 samples were measured throughout the experiment and the average capacitance measurements represented a variety of surface charges resulting from DNA molecule immobilization and hybridization. The capacitance changed from 11.58 pF to 114.5 pF when specific ssDNA was attached to electrodes and then increased to 218.6 pF once complementary strand DNA was introduced and hybridized with existing DNA chains. In addition, using impedance analyzer measurements, the resonant frequency decreased from 2.01 MHz to 1.97 MHz in the presence of ssDNA and decreased further down to 0.95 MHz after the complementary strand DNA was deposited.

Design of a compact reconfigurable bandpass filter using interdigital capacitor, DMS slots and varactor diode for wireless RF systems

This paper proposes a new design of a reconfigurable bandpass filter based on an interdigital capacitor and varactor diode for wireless and mobile applications. The designed reconfigurable bandpass filter has been implemented on an RT 6010 substrate with a relative dielectric constant of 10.2, thickness of 1.27 mm, and loss tangent of 0.0023. In order to reduce the filter size, the defected microstrip structure (DMS) is used due to its easy design, high compactness, high quality factor and easy integration with other RF devices. The suggested reconfigurable filter has a simple structure with a very attractive compact size of 4.7 × 8.4 mm2, low insertion loss than -1 dB, and tuning range (2–2.6 GHz).

Humidity-Sensing Chipless RFID Tag with Enhanced Sensitivity Using an Interdigital Capacitor Structure

An eight-bit chipless radio frequency identification tag providing humidity sensing and identification information is proposed. A compact, enhanced-sensitivity resonator based on an interdigital capacitor (IDC) structure is designed for humidity sensing, whereas seven electric-field-coupled inductor capacitor (ELC) resonators are used for identification information. These eight resonators are placed in a two-by-four array arrangement. A step-by-step investigation for the effect of varying the number of elements and array configuration on the resonant frequency and radar cross-section (RCS) magnitude of the IDC resonator is conducted. The RCS value of the resonant peak frequency for the IDC resonator increases as the number of array elements placed nearby increases due to the mutual coupling among the elements, and the increase in the RCS value becomes larger as the number of arrays increases in the vertical direction. Polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) is coated on the IDC-based resonator at a thickness of 0.02 mm. A non-reflective temperature and humidity chamber is fabricated using Styrofoam, and the relative humidity (RH) is varied from 50% to 80% in 10% intervals at 25 °C in order to measure a bistatic RCS of the proposed tag. The humidity sensing performance of the IDC resonator in the proposed tag is measured by the shift in the resonant peak frequency and the RCS value, and is compared with a single ELC resonator. Experiment results show that when RH increased from 50% to 80%, the sensitivities of both the resonant peak frequency and the RCS value of the IDC resonator were better than those of the ELC resonator. The variation in the RCS value is much larger compared to the resonant peak frequency for both IDC and ELC resonators. In addition, the resonant peak frequency and RCS value of the PVA-coated IDC-based resonator change, whereas those of the other seven resonators without a PVA coating do not change.