A Potassium-Selective Quartz Crystal Microbalance Sensor Based on Crown-Ether Functionalized Polymer Brushes

Benzo-15-crown-5 functionalized polymer brushes prepared via surface-initiated atom transfer radical polymerization are used as the active layer in a potassium-selective quartz crystal microbalance sensor. The polymer brushes allow the selective detection of potassium ions, even in the presence of a large excess of sodium ions and the sensitivity of the sensor can be tuned by varying the brush thickness.