Andreas Hierlemann

Biography

Microfabrication processes for chemical and biochemical sensors hold the potential to produce one or thousands of devices of micrometer and millimeter dimensions. This ability to fabricate many of these devices in parallel leads to tremendous cost savings and enables the production of array structures or large device series with minute fabrication tolerances. The paper "Microfabrication Techniques for Chemical/Biosensors" published in the June 2003 issue of the Proceedings of the IEEE by Henry Baltes, Oliver Brand, Christof Hagleitner and Andreas Hierlemann will be a valued reference to those involved in microfabrication for the foreseeable future. Originally asked to describe how microfabrication technology applies to chemical microsensors, the authors exceeded all expectations by crafting a powerful review that describes, compares and contrasts the principal approaches to microsensor technology, identifies them with their appropriate microfabrication technologies, and provides wide-ranging examples of each from numerous research groups. The paper provides a sound outline of fundamental chemical sensor principles,a definitive review of the advantages and disadvantages of fabricating devices via IC fabrication technology, a description of various microfabrication process flows, and a look at monolithic, integrated chemical and biological microsensor systems.

An associate professor of microsensorics in the Physics Department at ETH Zurich, Dr. Andreas Hierlemann has two primary areas of research. One is the development of CMOS chemical microsensor systems that, for example, can detect certain gases at trace level. His other research involves interfacing electrogenic cells to microelectronic chips and establishing bidirectional electrical communication between neurons and microelectronic chips. He has a doctoral degree in physical chemistry from the Eberhard-Karls University in Tübingen,Germany,and has held postdoctoral positions at Texas A&M University in College Station,Texas, and at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, New Mexico.