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FlexSens: Chemical Sensors for the 21st Century (FLEXSENS)
Start date: Sep 1, 2011, End date: Aug 31, 2015 PROJECT  FINISHED 

FlexSens aims to develop extremely versatile sensing strategies that can be used for the widespread generation of chemical information. The flexibility of the platform, then, refers to its ability to adapt to different environments, conditions and users. The work intends to bridge the gap between current technological developments in areas such as flexible electronics, smart textiles, wireless sensing networks, etc., and recent progress in sensors for analytical chemistry. Under guiding principles of a minimized human intervention, widespread availability and reduced costs, FlexSens will create autonomous or extremely simple tools to perform routine determinations that will not require direct intervention of an expert. Two main research lines will be explored:1) Life embedded objects2) Low cost disposable sensors.In the first one, the project will explore the incorporation of sensors in objects used in our everyday life, especially textiles. In the second one, extremely cheap, disposable paper printed sensors will be generated. The enabling technology will be a combination of recent progress in carbon nanotubes potentiometric sensing and printed electronics using carbon nanotubes inks. The end goal of FlexSens is to provide a battery of analytical approaches that can converge with existing and emerging social and technological trends to help in the solution of urgent social needs in many diverse areas, such as healthcare, environmental analysis, food production, etc.Carbon nanotubes will be immobilized in different surfaces -paper, cotton, rubbers- and properly functinoalized to create electrodes to be used in a potentiometric sensing scheme. The ways to generate the working and reference electrodes, their incorporation into everyday life objects and their final assessment in real life applications will be aim of this work.
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