Single nanoporous gold nanowire sensors

Chemisorption from the gas or liquid phase can result in a measurable resistance change in a metallic material when at least one dimension is smaller than the mean free path for electrons. Here we report on the fabrication of single nanoporous gold nanowires and demonstrate that adsorption of an alkanethiol can be monitored in real time. Single nanowire devices were fabricated by in situ etching of Au_0.18Ag_0.82 alloy nanowires in dilute nitric acid. The evolution of the porous structure was characterized by monitoring the resistance change and comparing to cross-sectional images. The feature size of about 10 nm is less than the mean free path for electrons in bulk gold, and hence the resistance is dominated by surface scattering. Adsorption of a monolayer of octadecanethiol onto the nanoporous gold nanowire results in a resistance change of about 3%. The sensitivity factor of 1.0 × 10^-16 cm² is comparable to values reported for adsorption at ultrathin films.