DNA origami based approach for an electrically driven single-photon source for contaminant detection in water

The European research project GREENER aims to develop a breakthrough technology for monitoring water quality that can reliably measure extremely low concentrations of pollutants, including endocrine disrupters. These contaminants pose a significant global health risk to humans and animals. The envisaged portable single-photon spectrometer combines quantum- and biotechnology and provides the possibilities of measurements with extremely low background noise based on a newly developed single-photon source in addition to a highly sensitive single-photon detector and will use enhanced signal processing through intelligent algorithms and AI. The new spectroscopic system will utilize a novel electrically-driven, quantum dot-based single-photon source. This will be achieved by integrating a single quantum dot (QD) into the layer stack of a light-emitting diode (LED) using DNA origami technology to position the single QD into the stack. In this paper, a detailed concept of the single-photon source will be presented and first results of the lens characterization are shown. Further the specifically developed DNA-origami design and its controlled self-organization-based deposition as DNA origami-QDhybrid (DO-QD hybrid) system to guarantee the integration of one hybrid per chip are shown.