Highly sensitive transistor sensor for biochemical sensing and health monitoring applications: a review

Abstract

Transistors have gained tremendous attraction in biochemical sensing due to their outstanding performance with high sensitivity, flexibility, selectivity, real-time monitoring, ease of fabrication, and biocompatibility for various point-of-care biomedical and healthcare applications. Herein, critical sensing capability by different transistor classes of i) organic field-effect transistor, ii) organic electrochemical transistor, iii) low dimensional semiconductor field-effect transistor, and iv) hybrid transistors are summarized for biochemical (e.g., ions, glucose, antigen/antibody, DNA, bacteria, virus, cancer biomarkers) detection. Recent advancements in the transistor field for bioanalyte sensing, including a new class of a photoelectrochemical transistor, bioreceptor conjugation, strategies to improve sensitivity and overcoming the limit of detection are discussed in a focused manner. Furthermore, organic and inorganic active material-based transistors are compared to find the best fit for specific target bio-detection and healthcare applications.