A scalable surface-acoustic-wave- (SAW-) based cantilevered device for portable bio-chemical sensing applications is presented. Even in the current, proof-of-principle implementation this architecture is shown to outperform commercial quartz-crystal microbalances in terms of sensitivity. Adhesion of analytes on a functionalized surface of the cantilever shifts the resonant frequency of a SAW-generating transducer due to the stress-induced variation of the speed of surface acoustic modes. We discuss the relevance of this approach for diagnostics applications based on miniaturized devices.
Keywords: Cantilever bio-sensor; Surface acoustic wave.
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