Chloroform in water is an environmental contaminant with health implications.From chloroform in drinking water,to water treatment facilities,to chloroform level in swimming pools,an efficient way to monitor its level is highly desirable.In fact,the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry has it listed as the 11th priority in their 2005 list of hazardous substances3.There are various ways chloroform can be detected.Some of the more commonly used methods include gas/liquid chromatography in combination with detection techniques such as electron capture detector,electrolytic conductivity,flame/photoionization,mass spectrometry and UV absorption.Commonly used detection methods tend to be bulky and/or expensive.We propose turning commercially available microfabricated quartz tuning forks into chloroform detectors by modifying them with proper polymer wires.This type of sensor has demonstrated its usefulness in detecting other analytes such as water vapor,ethanol,nitroethylbenzene,ammonia,etc.In addition,the proposed sensor can be quite portable,relatively low cost and with good sensitivity.With the low cost and low power consumption of each individual tuning fork sensor,an array of sensors(Figure 1)can be readily employed to further improve selectivity and reducing interferences from other chemicals without the use of gas/liquid chromatography.
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