Self-Assembly of Polymer Brush-Functionalized Inorganic Nanoparticles: From Hairy Balls to Smart Molecular Mimics

Abstract

New opportunities for complex and controllable self-organization of inorganic nanoparticles (e.g., quantum dots, plasmonic or magnetic nanoparticles) are provided when the stabilizing organic layer at the nanoparticle surface consists of a polymer brush of densely grafted chains. We highlight recent advances in the synthesis and self-assembly of these unique building blocks, termed polymer brush-functionalized nanoparticles (PBNPs). We show how the field has progressed from PBNPs with isotropic, single-component brushes showing limited self-assembly behavior to PBNPs with anisotropic brushes showing directional interactions and complex self-organization. We further discuss how PBNPs with isotropic multicomponent brushes, either mixed brushes or grafted block copolymers, can also exhibit the complex self-organization of molecular amphiphiles via rearrangements within the brush enabled by conformational flexibility. Through numerous examples, we show how established principles of polymer science and surface...