Exploring electric field sensing for solid-state nanopores

Abstract

Solid-state nanopores have received substantial attention in the past years owing to their simplicity and potential applications expected in genomics, sensing, archival information storage, and computing. The underlying sensing technique of nanopore technology is the analysis of modulations in the ionic current while molecules are electrophoretically driven through the nanopore. This current blockade-based sensing is presently well recognized and commercially used for applications such as DNA sequencing. However, this ionic currentbased method has limitations and increased complexity for futuristic applications such as single molecular protein sequencing, where diverse charges and shape distributions are involved. A high throughput readout method that can be used in extreme environments and has improved sensitivity to the mixed charge profiles and shape of the analytes is required. In this work, we present an exploratory finite element simulation study on the feasibility of using electric-field modulations instead of ionic current blockades for nanopore translocation measurements. This electric field sensing technique has further advantages over ionic current blockade measurements. For instance, Electric field sensing is capable of size and charge discretion with lesser noise and does not mandate the presence of an electrolyte solution. This technique can be used in extreme environments and developed for defense and space applications such as detecting air-born particles and future mars, moon, and Europa missions. We hope this work will be a starting point for developing electric field sensing for nanopore applications and opening the field of nanopore electrometry.