Biomolecular Electronics

1) Introduction, overview; 2) fundamentals (electronic structure, chemical bonds, hybridization, organic compounds, polymers, lipid bilayers, DNA, proteins, the solid-liquid interface); 3) building units (wires, insulators, diodes); 4) electronic transport (classical transport, band conductivity, tunneling, hopping, coupling to contacts, discrete level model, rectification); 5) bio-molecular surface functionalization (Langmuir Blodgett, self-assembled monolayers, functionalization with biomolecules);
6) experimental test systems (scanning probes, break junctions, nanogaps, monolayer junctions); 7) electrical biosensors: surface plasmon resonance, quartz microbalance, nanopores, nanowires 8) charge transfer and transport in biomolecules: DNA and proteins; 9) organic electronics (organic thin-film transistors)

After successful completion of the module the students understand the most important mechanisms and structures of bio-molecular electronics; they know fundamentals of combining these concepts into the design of basic systems, based on bio-molecular devices.

Students should have passed following modules before taking the course:

- Werkstoffe, Elektronische Bauelemente
- Festkörper-, Halbleiter- und Bauelementephysik
- Nanotechnologie

In addition to classical lecture teaching and individual learning methods of the students an in-depth aquisition of knowledge shall be realized by solving calculation problems; the students get in early contact to current research topics by lab visits.

Following media will be used for teaching purposes:
- Presentations, handout notes, blackboard notes, tablet-PC, lab tours

Nanoelectronics and Information Technology. Advanced Electronic Materials and Novel Devices, R. Waser (Ed.), 3rd Ed., Wiley-VCH (2012)

Introduction to Nanoscience, S.M. Lindsay, Oxford (2010)

Molecular Electronics: An Introduction to Theory and Experiment; Juan Carlos Cuevas / Elke Scheer, World Scientific (2010)
Additional material will be provided on Moodle.

written (60 min.);
The written exam is composed of calculation exercises and short questions about the entire lecture contents; it serves as an examination of the basic understanding of mechanisms and structures of bio-molecular electronics, and of present standard techniques to build basic systems based on those devices.