# A Symmetric U-Shaped Gate Tunnel FET-ISFET Hybrid Label-Free Biosensor for Highly Sensitive DNA Detection

**Authors:** Yourui An, Yang Li, Shupeng Chen, Shulong Wang, Zhenhao Wen, Xiaoli Yang, Hongxia Liu

PMC · DOI: 10.3390/s26041337 · 2026-02-19

## TL;DR

This paper introduces a new biosensor combining ISFET and TFET technologies for highly sensitive DNA detection.

## Contribution

The novel hybrid biosensor design achieves high current and threshold voltage sensitivity through a symmetric U-shaped gate structure.

## Key findings

- The biosensor achieves a maximum current sensitivity of 99.99% and threshold voltage sensitivity of 124%.
- Geometric dimensions and gate dielectric materials significantly impact device performance.

## Abstract

Ion-Sensitive Field-Effect Transistors (ISFETs) have been extensively used to detect various biomolecules, as the intrinsic charge of these molecules can change the transistor’s current or threshold voltage. Recently, realizing ISFET biosensors with better performance has attracted much attention. This paper proposes a novel ISFET biosensor by using the advantage of Tunnel Field-Effect Transistor (TFET). The device characteristics and sensing performance are systematically investigated by Silvaco Atlas TCAD simulations. Due to the novel structural design, the proposed sensor achieves a maximum current sensitivity (SIDSmax) of 99.99% and a threshold voltage sensitivity (SVTH) of 124%. To provide optimization guidelines, this work further explored the effect of geometric dimensions and gate dielectric materials on device performance. The excellent performance of the proposed biosensor makes it a promising candidate for future low-power, high-sensitivity biodetection applications.

## Full-text entities

- **Genes:** IDS (iduronate 2-sulfatase) [NCBI Gene 3423] {aka ID2S, MPS2, SIDS}
- **Diseases:** injury to (MESH:D014947)
- **Chemicals:** Si (MESH:D012825), Complementary Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor (-), salt (MESH:D012492), SiO2 (MESH:D012822), p-PAD (MESH:C077792), titanium (MESH:D014025), Al2O3 (MESH:D000537), hydrogen (MESH:D006859), Ge (MESH:D005857), biotin (MESH:D001710), Hafnium Oxide (MESH:C545179), oxide (MESH:D010087)
- **Species:** Homo sapiens (human, species) [taxon 9606]

## Figures

13 figures with captions in the complete paper: https://tomesphere.com/paper/PMC12944272/full.md

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Source: https://tomesphere.com/paper/PMC12944272