Dec-09-14
A new wireless chemical sensor from MIT could one day see us checking for spoiled food, or hazardous gases, with a smartphone.
The simple and inexpensive sensors are made from modified near-field communication tags, which can be read by most modern smartphones. The team altered the tags by punching a hole through them, then reconnecting the disrupted circuitry by "drawing" carbon nanotubes using a special pencil also created by the team in 2012.
The new tags, called CARDs (chemically actuated resonant devices), are powered by the short bursts of a smartphone's magnetic field as it is brought near the tag to read it. When the carbon nanotubes bind to the target gas, their electrical conductivity changes, in turn shifting the radio frequencies at which it can receive power. This means that when a smartphone is brought near the CARD, the card will only respond if its circuit has not been altered—signifying that the target gas is not present.
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GIZMAG.COM]
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