Investigation of Novel Nanoscale Materials, Methods and Instrumentation for Sensing Applications

The importance of sensors and instrumentations capable of detecting chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear and explosive (CBRNE) signatures in real-time intended towards their application in the areas of homeland security, environmental monitoring as well as under various medical and industrial settings cannot be overstated. We report here on the development of indium oxide (In2O3) nanowire-based sensor material and the successful demonstration of an alternate detection architecture by decoupling the sensor and readout electronics to solve a long-standing problem regarding stand-off detection of ionizing radiation occurring due to nuclear and radiological events using millimeter wave technology. Further, taking advantage of recent advances in high-speed broadband digitizers and arbitrary waveform generators, design and operation of a compact 110–140 GHz fast sweep chirped-pulse Fourier transform millimeter wave spectrometer (CP-FTMMW) has been demonstrated capable of performing trace gas analysis at room temperature with high sensitivity and specificity.