Self Assembly of Colloidal Gold Nanoparticles on Diblock Copolymer Thin Film Templates

Self-assembly of metallic nanoparticles were investigated for the development of field-enhanced chemical and biological detection devices with the capacity to achieve single-molecule level detection resulting from surface enhanced Raman scattering, associated with closely spaced noble metal nanostructures. Using chemical selfassembly, we attached monodisperse, colloidal gold nanoparticles on self-organized polymer templates, patterning arrays of nanoparticle clusters with sub-10 nanometer interparticle spacing in order to engineer enhanced optical fields. Poly(methyl methacrylate) domains in phase-separated polystyrene-b-poly(methyl methacrylate) diblock copolymer thin films were chemically modified with surface amination for varied arrangements. Chemically synthesized sub-20 nm diameter gold nanoparticles were attached to the aminefunctionalized surfaces using EDC linking chemistry with thioctic acid ligand-bound to the nanoparticle surface.