Polymer Microsensor System for Chemical Agent Detection

While the threat of chemical and biological weapon deployment has increased alarmingly in recent years, the sensitive and specific detection of chemical warfare (CW) agents remains a significant challenge. To achieve maximum effectiveness, small inexpensive sensors are required for deployment in a user-wearable badge format. Satisfying these demanding requirements necessitates a novel approach to CW agent sensing. A particularly attractive approach is to exploit the powerful detection capabilities of conductive polymers, plastic materials whose electrical properties can be engineered to change in a sensitive and controlled manner upon exposure to specific chemical species. Chemical specificity is achieved by constructing an array of polymer sensors whose composite response provides a unique sical Sciences Inc. (PSI) proposes to develop a simple, inexpensive microsensor system for ultrasensitive, specific detection of CW agents. The system consists of a replaceable array of conductive polymer sensors coupled to a readout device. The microsensor will be credit card-sized, and ruggedized for battlefield deployment.In Phase I a prototype microsensor system will be constructed to demonstrate detection of agent simulants in the presence of battlefield interferents. The Phase I results will be utilized to complete a preliminary design of the Phase II system.