A Sub-10 nm Vertical Organic/Inorganic Hybrid Transistor for Pain-Perceptual and Sensitization-Regulated Nociceptor Emulation |
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Authors: | Guangdi Feng Jie Jiang Yuhang Zhao Shitan Wang Biao Liu Kai Yin Dongmei Niu Xiaohui Li Yiqin Chen Huigao Duan Junliang Yang Jun He Yongli Gao Qing Wan |
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Affiliation: | 1. Hunan Key Laboratory of Super Microstructure and Ultrafast Process, School of Physics and Electronics, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, 410083 P. R. China;2. School of Physics and Information Technology, Shanxi Normal University, Xi'an, 710119 China;3. State Key Laboratory of Advanced Design and Manufacturing for Vehicle Body, College of Mechanical and Vehicle Engineering, Hunan University, Changsha, 410082 P. R. China;4. Hunan Key Laboratory of Super Microstructure and Ultrafast Process, School of Physics and Electronics, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, 410083 P. R. China
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, 14627 USA;5. School of Electronic Science & Engineering and Collaborative Innovation Centre of Advanced Microstructures, Nanjing University, Nanjing, 210093 China |
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Abstract: | Pain-perceptual nociceptors (PPN) are essential sensory neurons that recognize harmful stimuli and can empower the human body to react appropriately and perceive precisely unusual or dangerous conditions in the real world. Furthermore, the sensitization-regulated nociceptors (SRN) can greatly assist pain-sensitive human to reduce pain sensation by normalizing hyperexcitable central neural activity. Therefore, the implementation of PPNs and SRNs in hardware using emerging nanoscale devices can greatly improve the efficiency of bionic medical machines by giving them different sensitivities to external stimuli according to different purposes. However, current most-normal organic/oxide transistors face a great challenge due to channel scaling, especially in the sub-10 nm channel technology. Here, a sub-10 nm indium-tin-oxide transistor with an ultrashort vertical channel as low as ≈3 nm, using sodium alginate bio-polymer electrolyte as gate dielectric, is demonstrated. This device can emulate important characteristics of PPN such as pain threshold, memory of prior injury, and pain sensitization/desensitization. Furthermore, the most intriguing character of SRN can be achieved by tuning the channel thickness. The proposed device can open new avenues for the fascinating applications of next-generation neuromorphic brain-like systems, such as bio-inspired electronic skins and humanoid robots. |
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Keywords: | organic/inorganic hybrid transistors pain-perceptual nociceptors sensitization-regulated nociceptors vertical channels |
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