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Chemical sensors can be used to analyze a wide variety of environmental and biological gases and liquids and may need to be able to selectively detect a target analyte. Different methods, including gas chromatography, chemiluminescence, selected ion flow tube, and mass spectroscopy, have been used to measure biomarkers. These methods show variable results in terms of sensitivity for some applications and may not meet the requirements for a handheld biosensor. A promising sensing technology utilizes AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs). HEMT structures have been developed for use in microwave power amplifiers due to their high two dimensional electron gas (2DEG) mobility and saturation velocity. The conducting 2DEG channel of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs is very close to the surface and extremely sensitive to adsorption of analytes. HEMT sensors can be used for detecting gases, ions, pH values, proteins, and DNA. In this paper we review recent progress on functionalizing the surface of HEMTs for specific detection of glucose, kidney marker injury molecules, prostate cancer, and other common substances of interest in the biomedical field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Au-gated AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistor (HEMT) structures were functionalized in the gate region with label-free 3′-thiol-modified oligonucleotides. This serves as a binding layer to the AlGaN surface for hybridization of matched target deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy shows the immobilization of thiol-modified DNA covalently bonded with gold on the gated region. Hybridization between probe DNA and matched or mismatched target DNA on the Au-gated HEMT was detected by electrical measurements. The HEMT drain-source current showed a clear decrease of 115 μA as this matched target DNA was introduced to the probe DNA on the surface, showing the promise of the DNA sequence detection approach for biological sensing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]