A Novel Dielectric modulated Step-Channel junction less TFET(DM-SC-JLTFET) for label-free detection of Brest cancer Cells: Design and Sensitivity analysis

doi:10.21203/rs.3.rs-2726874/v1

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A Novel Dielectric modulated Step-Channel junction less TFET(DM-SC-JLTFET) for label-free detection of Brest cancer Cells: Design and Sensitivity analysis

https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-2726874/v1

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published 14 Sep, 2023

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This work designs a novel dielectric modulated step channel Junctionless tunnel field effect (DM-SC-JLTFET) for the label-free detection of breast cancer cells using their dielectric constant (K) values. The dielectric modulation technique is exploited to detect breast cancer cells (BCC) whose K values are observed at 200 MHz frequency using an open-ended coaxial probe technique. The charge plasma concept is employed to suppress the random dopant fluctuation (RDF). The usage of this concept rendering the complex fabrication process simple and affordable. A novel step channel structure has been implemented with reduced substrate thickness for the TFET device that improves the efficacy of the biosensor. The proposed device uses on-current (I_on) and ambipolar current (I_amb) to measure the sensitivity of cancer biomolecules. An in-depth analysis has been carried out for the biosensor by considering performance parameters such as the electrostatics of the device, energy band diagram, lateral electric field, and threshold voltage (V_th). The device sensitivity is analyzed using parameters like I_on/I_off, I_off/I_amb current ratio, Subthreshold Swing (SS), and V_th. The proposed device reports high detection sensitivity of 2.683x10⁶ and a low SS of 32 mV/dec for breast cancer cell biomolecule T47D (K = 32), effectively reducing the RDF effect. The simulated device shows enhanced sensitivity and higher compatibility for breast cancer cell detection, and this device will be an excellent alternative to classical vivo breast cancer detection.

&ndash

Ambipolar Conduction

Biosensor

breast cancer cells (BCC)

Dielectric modulation (DM)

TFET

Label-free detection. Point of care of Testing (PoCT)

Cancer is one of the most dangerous diseases, which is the cause of the increased mortality rate around the

World. Irrespective of the age group and the gender difference, this disease affects the person, and the extreme case, this leads to the cause of death. External bio-organisms are not the prime cause of the disease, and this is because of the specific genetic mutation of the tissues or the cells in the human body [1]. The early stage of the disease starts with a single tissue or cell that keeps multiplying its count and turns into a tumor that has a considerable size, and this size keeps on increasing. Based on the affected tissue and the root of origin, the cancer disease has been classified into several types: colorectal cancer, throat cancer, breast, and lung cancer [2]. Among all the different types of cancers, lung, colorectal, and breast cancer is the most common type of cancer that is well-known and most affected cancer around the world. Especially in women, breast cancer type is the most affected cancer and takes the share of 11.6% among all different cancers, and across the globe, more than 6% of people die of cancer every year due to this dangerous disease [3].

A cancer diagnosis at an earlier stage can save human life by following sophisticated treatment methods, reducing mortality rates. X-Ray mammography is the classical tool used to diagnose cancer inlier days, and this method has undergone huge technological improvement. The X-Ray mammography diagnosis method reported colossal progress, but still, it has some limitations due to several factors. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) surpasses the restriction of the traditional X-Ray mammography-based detection method. It reports enhanced sensitivity by improving the contrast of tissue and tumor images from 93–100% [4–5]. The diagnosis of cancer with MRI and ultrasonography gives precise results. Still, they require a vast amount for the establishment and a skilled person to operate the sophisticated machines, or else they lead to additional damage to the patient. Another aspect is that these facilities are primarily available to people living in metropolitan and urban areas. In contrast, people in remote areas do not have direct access to these sophisticated and cost-effective methods. So, there is a considerable demand for the simplified diagnosis technique, which is low cost, simple to perform tests, and robust as an alternative to the increased cost of medical diagnosis [6].

Recently, biosensors gained massive attention across the globe with their ability to replace classical laboratory-based diagnosis techniques. These biosensors are creating a revolutionary medical diagnosis change by providing a point of care of testing (PoCT) at the patient location. The Field Effect Transistor-based biosensors have become more popular with their compact size, the possibility of sensor and actuator integration on a single chip, and simple operation [6–8]. The dielectric modulation (DM) technique is a label-free method for detecting biomolecules, and this takes the FET-based biosensor to an extreme level and is used for multiple detection techniques in different applications. In the DM technique, the K value of the target biomolecule is considered a prime parameter, and a cavity is created by etching the gate oxide region to immobilize the biomolecules. This DM technique provides accurate and faster detection results compared to the other diagnosis approaches, and the DM technique is simple and user-friendly. The DM-FET biosensors performance is limited by short channel effects (SCEs), which are encountered in the process of downscaling the device size, and the FET device's subthreshold swing restriction also becomes one of the main obstacles to achieving better sensitivity results [9–10]. Because of its capacity to overcome the constraint on the subthreshold swing (SS < 60 mV/Dec) and its novel band-to-band tunneling of charge carriers, the tunnel FET device has arisen as a possible alternative to the traditional FET-based device [11–20].

Using an open-ended coaxial probe method, the dielectric properties of several in vitro breast cancer cell lines are investigated between 200 MHz and 13.6 GHz [53]. It contains regular and cancer breast cell lines (MCF-10A) (T47D, Hs578T, MCF-7, and MDA-MB-231). The dielectric characteristics of human tissues were measured between 50 and 900 MHz, and it was observed that cancer tissues, in contrast to normal tissues of the same kind, have higher permittivity and conductivity. In addition, a dielectric-modulated TFET device may be efficiently implemented for breast cancer cell detection as an exemplary method for primary disease diagnosis, provided one is familiar with the dielectric value of breast tissues at various microwave frequencies.

This work presents a novel approach for diagnosing breast cancer disease using the dielectric modulation technique. A novel step channel Junction less TFET (SC-JLTFET) device is simulated to detect breast cancer cells (BCC) using its K value by DM technique. In the proposed SC-JL-TFET device, the channel region contains a non-uniform shape where the thickness of the channel is reduced near the drain end [21–25]. This reduced channel thickness near the drain end improves the gate control over the channel by accumulating the high charge at the gate-oxide interface. In this non-uniform channel, the effective channel length covered by the gate remains constant, but the effective area is reduced. The non-uniform structure with the step channel enhances the performance by reducing the ambipolar current (Iamb), and the leakage current is also minimized due to the junction-less approach. The proposed structure limits the ambipolar current of the device without any additional arrangement due to structural advantage where the net charge of the carrier is reduced at the secondary tunneling junction of the TFET device.

The combination of III-IV group material in the source place of the SC-JL-TFET enhances the device's on current (I_on) by shortening the source-channel interface tunneling width. In general, the earlier reported TFET biosensor uses high-doing profiles in the substrate region of the TFET, resulting in a highly complex fabrication process and high thermal budgets. Another major issue in the physical doped TFET device is the development of abrupt junction profiles which is highly challenging and suffers from Random dopant fluctuations (RDF) [25–27].

Table 1

Performance comparison of different JL-TFET biosensors reported.
Junction-less Devices Reported	Sensitivity Comparison
Junction-less Devices Reported	Sensitivity (Sss)	Sensitivity (S_Ids)	Sensitivity (S_Ion/Ioff)
[24]	0.96	2.88X10¹¹	2.24X10⁸
[44]	--	2.546X10⁴	7.65
[49]	0.54	5.12X10⁵	95.3
[50]	0.33	---	1.64X10⁰²
[51]	0.788	8.60X10¹¹	1.0X10⁵
[52]		7.19X10⁴	2.95X10⁴

Many researchers reported numerous JL-TFET biosensors with different structural approaches to overcome the challenges faced by junction-based TFET biosensors. These RDFs effectively degrade the device performance, so the junction-less TFET device is proposed using the charge plasma concept in this work. Table 1 gives the performance comparison of the available literature for the JL-TFET biosensors, where every structure change will improve the performance in terms sensitivity of the device.

Section II is devoted to a brief description of device architecture and simulation environment setup. The device performance is analyzed with different parameters like on current (I_on), switching current ratio, SS, and threshold voltage sensitivity. The corresponding results are presented in section III by comparing the detection sensitivity for different cancer biomolecules. In section III, the proposed device performance is compared with the earlier reported TFET biosensor, followed by the conclusion in section IV.

Figure 1 shows the 2D structure of the proposed DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor, in which the source area comprises heterostructures containing a combination of group III-IV elements, i.e., Si and Ge. This heterostructure helps to overcome the low-on-current (I_on) problem of the TFET by increasing the total tunneling rate of electrons and holes [30–35]. The JL-TFET device is formed by selecting an appropriate metal work function for electrodes [36–38]. The n⁺ source region is formed by placing the platinum electrode with work function Φ_Sd = 5.93 eV over the intrinsic substrate with uniform doping of 1x10¹⁸ cm^− 3. A step channel structure is proposed for the device with reduced channel thickness when moving toward the drain region from the source end. This non-uniform channel provides a lower effective mass for the electron near the source side, which helps to enhance the on (I_on) current. Additionally, this non-uniform channel helps reduce channel thickness near the drain side, which helps to reduce the ambipolar current and off-state current (I_off) of the TFET device. This can be explained by the Wentzel–Kramers–Brillouin (WKB) equation [39–40] given as

$$T(E)=exp( - \frac{2}{\hbar }\smallint \sqrt {2m_{c}^{*}({E_{barrier}}(x) - E)dx} )$$

(1)

From the above equation, ${m}_{c}^{*}$ gives the effective mass (EM) exhibited by the electron, which directly

Table 2

Simulation Setup for the DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor
Physical Parameter	Symbol	Value (nm)
Channel length	L_Ch1	20
Channel length	L_Ch2	10
Thickness of channel	T_Ch1	10
Thickness of channel	T_Ch2	8
Source and Drain length	L_source, L_Drain	30
Nano cavity length & thickness	L_NC, T_NC	10,5
Silicon thickness	T_si	10
HfO₂ Thickness	T_Hfo2	8
Thickness of the buffer layer	T_Sio2	2
Substrate doping	N_sub	1x10¹⁸ cm^− 3
Gate work function	Φ_Ga	4.5 eV
Source and drain electrode work function	Φ_Sd	5.93 eV &3.9 eV

Table 3

Breast cancer cell lines with K values [53].
Name of the BCC	K value for cancer cells taken for open-ended coaxial probe technique [53]
T47D	32
MCF7	27.5
MDA-MB-231	24.5
HS578t	22
MCF-10A	4.5

influences the tunneling rate, and from the above equation, we can conclude that the lower the EM of the electron, the higher the tunneling rate is achieved.

The gate electrode is formed by depositing the gate electrode having work function Φ_Ga = 4.5 eV, which includes intrinsic doping in the step channel region of the device. The nanocavity regions are created under the gate metal by selectively removing the gate oxide material, and the cavity dimensions are chosen so that the target cancer biomolecules are perfectly immobilized without any difficulties. The proposed DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor uses a non-uniform channel that can simultaneously increase on (I_on) current and reduces ambipolar current (I_amb), so the cavity is placed in two positions, i.e., near the wide and narrow channel junction to investigate device sensitivity. This can be observed in Figs. 1(a) & 1(b). The simulation parameters are listed in Table 2, and the target BCC line with the K values is given in Table 3. Here in this simulation, the BCC's dielectric values are taken into account by ignoring the open-ended coaxial probe technique and its frequency of operation.

Generally, the hetero material TFET device performance is limited because of the less oxide-semiconductor interface, which results in high SS and low on current. So, to overcome this issue, a stack gate oxide structure is implemented with High-K dielectric materials. The High-K gate oxide material controls and increase the tunneling rate even at a low energy level by decreasing the tunneling barrier length of the charge carriers. Figure 1 shows very clearly where a thin layer of Sio₂ is formed under the High-K HfO₂ gate oxide material, and this thin buffer layer improves biomolecules interaction rules with semiconductor material and acts as an adhesion layer.

The method of the cancer cell extraction from the human breast is explained in Fig. 2(a) and includes several processed steps, and once the cancer cell is separated, they are made to immobilize in the nanocavity area of the proposed DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor. The current simulated device is calibrated using the experimental results given by C.-H. Kim et al.[6] to validate the structure, the simulated device reports similar values to the reported data, illustrated in Fig. 2(b). The device calibration is carried out by choosing the BTBT model as the parameter that measures the drain current (I_ds) for a change in the gate voltage(V_gs). The advancement technologies made the fabrication of complex devices simple, and Fig. 2(c) gives the fabrication flow of the proposed DM-SC-JLTFET device that involves various process steps to get the final device.

As a demonstration, the electrical properties of the suggested biosensor are simulated and characterized using the Silvaco ATLAS TCAD simulator [41]. The biosensor features are examined using the field-dependent mobility model, Shockley-Read-Hall (SRH), Auger recombination, and Fermi Dirac models. The nonlocal band-to-band tunneling (BTBT) model is used to consider tunneling in the simulation—the nonlocal BTBT model, which can be expressed as helpful in calculating the drain current of TFETs. In addition, the band gap narrowing (BGN) model is included to observe how effectively the charge plasma can influence the doping of the device. All the simulations are carried out in a similar environment to have consistency in the detection sensitivity of the biosensor.

This device utilizes the dielectric modulation (DM) method to implement the label-free detection of breast cancer disease. In this section, we describe the results of our investigation into the DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor's performance using various settings for the TFET device's electrical characteristics. We have taken the K value of the breast cancer cell lines reported at 230 MHz in Table 3. So, the target cancer cells are made to immobilize in the cavity area of the DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor one after another, and the corresponding electrostatic parameters are recorded. When calculating the device's sensitivity, an air-filled cavity with a dielectric constant value of K = 1 is considered as the reference reading. The non-tumor breast cell (i.e., MCF10A) was also included in the analysis to show how the proposed DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor can differentiate the tumor cell into healthier breast cells.

A: Impact dielectric constant value on Energy band, Potential, and Electric field.

The shift in the energy band is the prime impact observed in the semiconductor biosensor when the target biomolecules are immobilized in the nanocavity region. The energy band shift entirely relays on the relative permittivity of the target biomolecules, and here in this proposed DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor, the absence of cancer biomolecules is represented concerning K = 1(air) or K = 4.5, which is a non-cancer-breast-cancer-cell. Figure 3(a) depicts the energy band diagram of the DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor with different biomolecules with an increased dielectric constant value. This energy band diagram is drawn for the device whose cavity is formed over the primary tunneling Junction, i.e., Fig. 1(a). The biomolecules' dielectric constant value decides the band energy twist and reduces the tunneling width between the conduction and valance band energy. Higher values of dielectric constant in biomolecules result in a greater energy-gap twist. So here, BCC T47D (K = 32) has more twists and less tunneling width for the charge carriers.

Figure 3(b) illustrates the electric field of the DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor for the given BCC immobilized in the cavity region. This device shows a high electric field near the source-channel interface due to the implemented step channel structure of the device. More charge carriers are exchanged at this primary tunneling junction concerning the increased K-values of the biomolecules. The increase in the K-value increases the interface capacitance at the oxide and semiconductor interface, and this, in turn, increases the electric Potential. Figure 3(b) shows that the higher dielectric constant valued cancer biomolecules result in higher electric filed under the cavity region of the channel.

The lateral electric field contour of the DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor is shown in Fig. 4 for all the target BCC, non-tumor cells, and air. So, the lateral electric field increases as the conjugation of the target.

biomolecules increase in the cavity region for the increment in the dielectric constant (K) value in the cavity region and the highest electric field of 1.689x10⁶ V/cm obtained for T47D (K = 32) breast cancer biomolecule. This lateral field kept on decreasing when it moved to the drain side from the channel region, and this is because of the increased carrier exchange near the source channel junction.

The surface potential plot of the proposed device is illustrated in Fig. 3(c), where the lowest surface potential is observed for the device when the device is empty or for the non-tumor breast cell (i.e., K = 1 (air), K = 4.5 (MCF-10A)). Immobilized biomolecules' dielectric constant value is responsible for the device's resultant surface potential. The rise in the K value increases the surface potential by increasing the effective capacitance at the interface of the oxide-semiconductor region, and this device reports 1.635 V for T47D (K = 32) breast tumor cells.

The energy band at the interface of Silicon with the platinum material is depicted in Fig. 3(d), which is extracted by drawing a vertical cutline between the silicon substrate with the platinum material. The platinum material forms a non-ohmic contact and imposes the required doping profile in the silicon substrate using the work function of the platinum metal. This contact effectively influences the electron due to the available free excess electrons in the platinum material. So, this effectively improves the device’s performance. The flat band voltage decreases with an increase in the K value of the target biomolecule, so the BCC results in higher surface potential compared to non-tumor breast cells, which will help in the increment of on current of the proposed biosensor. Figure 5 illustrates the contour of surface potential in the channel region of the proposed biosensor, where the potential levels increase with the increase of the K value of target biomolecules reaching the reduced thickness of the channel region.

B: Impact dielectric constant value(K) of cancer cells on drain current (I_ds & I_amb)

The drain current of the TFET device is influenced by the gate control on the channel area and the gate potential supplied. This is accomplished by adjusting the tunneling barrier length at the source-channel Junction. The source region combines Ge and Si material, which further reduces the tunneling Junction to increase the drain current. Here in the simulated DM-SC-JLTFET device, we have created the cavity area under the gate electrode of the device at both the primary and secondary tunneling junction to observe both drain current and ambipolar current. This is because the proposed step channel structure of the device effectively increases on (I_on) current and suppresses the ambipolar currents, where these two TFET devices’ currents are used for measuring the sensitivity device. The step channel structure was proposed for the device to reduce this ambipolar and leakage current, and here we made the additional cavity over the reduced thickness of the channel to immobilize the target biomolecules. First, the increase in the K value of the target BCC in the cavity region over the primary tunneling junction reduces the effective tunneling width to increase the on current of the device. This can be observed from Fig. 6 (a), where the low dielectric biomolecule and the non-tumor breast cell result in a low drain current compared to higher K-valued cancer cells.

The situation will be quite the opposite for the secondary tunneling junction, where the increased dielectric constant value increases the tunneling width to reduce the ambipolar current of the proposed device. When the K value has increased, this increases the tunneling barrier width by enlarging the flat band voltage of the device, so this help in further reduction of the ambipolar current of the proposed device. Figure 6(b) illustrates the drain current plot for the DM-SC-JLTFET device for various target biomolecules in the cavity region, which is located over the channel-drain region of the device.

Figure 7(a) give the I_on/I_off current ratio of the proposed biosensor for all the breast cancer cell. There is a constant increment in the current ratio of the proposed DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor, and this is due to the implementation of step channel structure with the JLTFET approach, which effectively reduces the I_off current. The Junction is not involved in device implementation, so the junction leakages are reduced, and the novel structure of the device improves the control of the gate over the channel region. This indirectly increases the on current, so the device reports a high current ratio of 5.3x10⁷ for K = 32 (T47D) breast cancer cells. On the other side, the cavity over the secondary channel region suppresses the ambipolar current with an increase in the K value of cancer cells; Fig. 7(b) gives the I_off/I_amb current ratio, and the device reports a high I_off/I_amb ratio of 1.256x10⁷ for the T47D cancer cell. The transconductance plot for the proposed device is shown in Fig. 7(c), where the device exhibits an increment in g_m for a change in the dielectric constant value of the target BCC. This plot shows that the device requires less power and is suitable for low-power applications. Therefore, the proposed device shows good linearity with the change in the dielectric constant of the target biomolecules. The efficiency and performance of the device are based on reported detection sensitivity, and a suitable biosensor possesses good sensitivity. To measure the sensitivity of the simulated DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor, we use the current ratio as one of the parameters, and the following equation gives the relation to measuring the device sensitivity.

$$S(Ion/Ioff)=\frac{{I(Ion/Ioff)(bio)-I(Ion/Ioff)(air)}}{{I(Ion/Ioff)(air)}}$$

(2)

S _Iamb =$\frac{{Ion(bio)-Ion(air)}}{{Ion(air)}}$ (3)

The current ratio reported in the non-presence of the biomolecule is treated as the base for calculating the device sensitivity. So, the proposed biosensor sensitivity can be measured by using either of the drain currents, and at the same time, both give a sensitivity reading of 2.683x10⁶ with Iamb and 9.29x10² with drain current ratio for K = 32 (T47D) breast cancer biomolecule. The corresponding sensitivity is shown in Fig. 8, and from these two sensitivity plots, we can conclude that the proposed device exhibits a high sensitivity and excellent variation for different BCC.

C: Impact dielectric constant value (K) of cancel cell on SS and threshold voltage (V_th)

For TFET-based biosensors, the essential performance parameter is subthreshold swing (SS), and this ss is related to V_gs by the following relation.

$${\text{SS}}=(\frac{{\partial {{\text{V}}_{{\text{gs}}}}}}{{\partial \log ({I_{{\text{ds}}}})}})$$

From the above equation, less the dependency of SS gate bias voltage and the prosed biosensor implements a step channel structure with Ge source, which keeps the tunneling width minimum to maintain a low SS value for a specific range of V_gs voltages. So, the DM-SC-JLTFET reports a decrease in SS for an increase in the K value of target biomolecules. Figure 9(a) illustrates the SS Figure for the proposed biosensor and the sensitivity, and the device reports an SS value of 32 mV/Dec for K = 32 and a sensitivity of S_SS of 0.24, which is measured using the equation.

Sensitivity ${\text{S}}{{\text{S}}_{{\text{SS}}}}=\frac{{SS(air)-SS(bio)}}{{SS(air)}}$ (5)

The reduced thickness of the channel increases the overall threshold voltage of the device, and this is because the gate requires a higher voltage to align the sub-energy bands of the device. The increment in the dielectric constant of the biomolecule increases the device's threshold voltage, which is observed in the proposed device, also. The change in the threshold voltage of the device is used for calculating the sensitivity of the biosensor by using the following relation given by Eq. (6)

S_Vth =$\frac{{Vth(bio)-Vth(air)}}{{Vth(air)}}$ (6)

Figure 9(b) illustrates the threshold voltage plot for the target cancer biomolecules along with the sensitivity (S_vth) measured with a threshold voltage, and the proposed device shows a high sensitivity of 0.30 for K = 32 (T47D) breast cancer cells.

D: Performance comparison with the existing literature.

The performance comparison of the proposed DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor with the earlier reported works is carried out in this section. This comparative study shows how the proposed biosensor enhances the sensitivity compared to the existing biosensors. The parameters are extracted by simulating the devices for the specific target biomolecules with a similar environment condition setup. Figure 10(a) gives the drain current comparison plot between the simulated device and work reported by S. Singh et al. [20].

The proposed device reported a higher drain current compared to the work written by S. Singh et al. [20], and this is because of the structure advantage applied to the proposed biosensor. The performance of the device compared to the works reported by different researchers [42–53] and Fig. 10 (b) gives the on current comparison plot for DM-SC-JLTFET biosensor with

Table 4

Performance comparison of proposed device with literature.
	K = 32 (T47D)
	I_on (A/µm)	SS (mV/Dec)	Drain current sensitivity
Proposed Device	3.90x10^− 04	32	2.3X10⁹
Ref [20]	3.15 x10^− 06	40	2.88 X10⁸
Ref [14]	1.98X10^− 06	-	10⁶
Ref [21]	1.68X10^− 5	35	2.6X10⁷

the reported literature. The proposed results are extracted for the dielectric constant value for Biotin (K = 2.63). The figure shows that the proposed device exhibits superior performance compared to the earlier reported works and records higher sensitivity than the reported devices. Table IV compares the proposed biosensor's performance with various works reported. From the table, we can conclude that the proposed device shows an overall enhancement of the detection sensitivity for cancer diagnosis compared to the other reported devices. The unique novel step channel with the Junction-less structure increases the device performance in every aspect of the device's electrical characteristics and helps advance disease diagnosis. This device can be used as the universal device for diagnosing the disease at the earlier stage to implement the PoCT medical diagnosis system.

This work investigates a novel step channel Junction-less TFET device performance to detect BCC using dielectric modulation techniques. All breast cancer cell lines and non-tumor cells are detected, and the corresponding sensitivity is measured using different electric parameters of the device like I_on/I_off, I_off/I_amb, SS, and threshold voltage (V_th). The device shows a high on current sensitivity of 2.3X10⁹ and an I_amb current sensitivity of 2.683x10⁶ for T47D (K = 32) BCC with a reported SS of 32 mV/Dec. The proposed device effectively reduces the RDF effect, the complex fabrication process, and the cost of production. The unique novel step channel with the Junction-less structure increases the device performance in every aspect of the electrical characteristics of the device. It helps in the advancement of disease diagnosis. This tool will assist in the earlier diagnosis of cancer disease, which has the potential to save human lives by improving the overall quality of life and reducing death rates among women. The simulated device shows enhanced sensitivity and higher compatibility for breast cancer cell detection, and this makes it an attractive prospect as a potential replacement for in vivo breast cancer diagnostics in the future.

Acknowledgment, The authors would like to thank VIT-AP University, Amaravati, for providing the necessary facilities for the research work.

Author Contributions: The manuscript was a collaborative effort, with Jayalakshmi Bitra taking responsibility for the writing, formatting, and drawing of all figures, while Gurumurthy Komanapalli provided valuable revisions.

Funding Statement: Not applicable

Data Availability All necessary data and materials are included in the manuscript.

Ethics Approval On behalf of the co-author, the corresponding author claims that there are no ethical issues.

Consent to Participate Both authors have equally contributed to the manuscript.

Consent for Publication Both authors give consent for Publication.

Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest On behalf of the co-author, the corresponding author claims that there is no conflict of interest.

CodeAvailability Not applicable.

Conflict of Interest:

All authors have participated in (a) conception and design, analysis, and interpretation of the data; (b) drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content; and (c) approval of the final version.

This manuscript has not been submitted to, nor is it under review at, another journal or other publishing venue. The authors have no affiliation with any organization with a direct or indirect financial interest in the subject matter discussed in the manuscript.

Compliance with Ethical Standards: The manuscript is prepared as per the ethical standard of the journal.

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A Novel Dielectric modulated Step-Channel junction less TFET(DM-SC-JLTFET) for label-free detection of Brest cancer Cells: Design and Sensitivity analysis

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I: Introduction

II: Device Architecture & simulation setup

III: Results and Discussions

B: Impact dielectric constant value(K) of cancer cells on drain current (I_ds & I_amb)

IV: Conclusion

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Journal Publication

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A Novel Dielectric modulated Step-Channel junction less TFET(DM-SC-JLTFET) for label-free detection of Brest cancer Cells: Design and Sensitivity analysis

Status:

Journal Publication

Version 1

Abstract

Figures

I: Introduction

II: Device Architecture & simulation setup

III: Results and Discussions

B: Impact dielectric constant value(K) of cancer cells on drain current (Ids & Iamb)

IV: Conclusion

Declarations

References

Additional Declarations

Status:

Journal Publication

Version 1

B: Impact dielectric constant value(K) of cancer cells on drain current (I_ds & I_amb)