Building Superlattices from Individual Nanoparticles via Template-Confined DNA-Mediated Assembly*

Abstract

DNA programmable assembly has been combined with top-down lithography to construct superlattices of discrete, reconfigurable nanoparticle (NP) architectures on a gold surface over large areas. Specifically, the assembly of individual colloidal plasmonic NPs with different shapes and sizes is controlled by oligonucleotides containing “locked” nucleic acids and confined environments provided by polymer pores to yield oriented architectures that feature tunable arrangements and independently controllable distances at both nanometer and micrometer length scales. DNA has become a powerful tool for constructing highly ordered materials from NP building blocks. Colloidal gold NPs of different shapes and sizes were similarly modified with DNA. Architectures of DNA functionalized NPs were then assembled within each pore of the poly(methyl methacrylate) template in a layer-by-layer fashion by designing the sticky-end DNA sequence present on a selected NP to be complementary to that of the previous layer.