Abstract.

Understanding the charge transfer mechanism through deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) molecules remains a challenge for numerous theoretical and experimental studies in order to be utilized in nanoelectronic devices. Various methods have attempted to investigate the conductivity of double-stranded (ds-) and single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) molecules. However, different electronic behaviors of these molecules are not clearly understood due to the complexity and lack of accuracy of the methods applied in these studies. In this work however, we demonstrated an electronic method to study the electrical behavior of synthetic ssDNA or dsDNA integrated within printed circuit board (PCB)-based metal (gold)-semiconductor (DNA) Schottky junctions. The results obtained in this work are in agreement with other studies reporting dsDNA as having higher conductivity than ssDNA as observed by us in the range of 4-6μA for the former and 2-3μA for the latter at an applied bias of 3V. Selected solid-state parameters such as turn-on voltage, series resistance, shunt resistance, ideality factor, and saturation current were also calculated for the specifically designed ss- and dsDNA sequences using the thermionic emission model. The results also showed that the highest conductance was observed for dsDNA with guanine and cytosine base pairs, while the lowest conductance was for ssDNA with adenine and thymine bases. We believe the results of this preliminary work involving the gold-DNA Schottky junction may allow the interrogation of DNA charge transfer mechanisms and contribute to better understanding its elusive electronic properties.

Graphical abstract

中文翻译：

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了解单链和双链DNA的电子性质。

摘要。

为了在纳米电子器件中利用，通过脱氧核糖核酸（DNA）分子了解电荷转移机制仍然是众多理论和实验研究的挑战。已经尝试了多种方法来研究双链（ds-）和单链DNA（ssDNA）分子的电导率。但是，由于这些研究中所用方法的复杂性和准确性不足，无法清楚地理解这些分子的不同电子行为。但是，在这项工作中，我们展示了一种电子方法，用于研究集成在基于印刷电路板（PCB）的金属（金）-半导体（DNA）肖特基结中的合成ssDNA或dsDNA的电行为。在这项工作中获得的结果与其他研究一致，在我们施加的3V偏压下，dsDNA的电导率比ssDNA高，前者为4-6μA，后者为2-3μA。还使用热电子发射模型为专门设计的ss和dsDNA序列计算了选定的固态参数，例如导通电压，串联电阻，分流电阻，理想因子和饱和电流。结果还表明，具有鸟嘌呤和胞嘧啶碱基对的dsDNA的电导最高，而具有腺嘌呤和胸腺嘧啶碱基的ssDNA的电导最低。

图形概要