Hiroshi Matsui, City University of New York, Hunter College, New York, NY
Non-lithographic fabrications of devices such as electronics and sensor have been studied extensively by assembling nanometer-sized building blocks into the device configurations. While various nanowires and nanoparticles with superior physical properties have been synthesized as the building blocks, more reproducible methods to assemble them onto precise positions are desirable to construct nanodevices. We developed triple helix peptide nanowires to incorporate biomolecular recognition components (antibody), and our strategy is to use those functionalized peptide nanowires, which can recognize and selectively bind a well-defined region on antigen-patterned substrates, as building blocks to assemble nanoscale architectures at uniquely defined positions. In order for the application in electric device fabrications, after configuring device geometries with these nanotubes by the biomolecular recognition, we turned on the biomineralization function of peptides on the nanotube sidewall to develop various material coatings such as metals and semiconductors for electronics and sensor applications. It should be noted that the coating morphology such as particle-domain size and inter-particle distance on the nanotubes could be tuned by peptide sequences and conformations. Due to these peptides' catalytic function, some semiconductor coatings could be developed at room temperature on the nanotube. We also produced various nanoparticles by using ring-shaped peptide assemblies as enzymatic templates. These nano-rings mimic the nature to grow crystals inside the cavities at room temperature, which normally require high temperature to grow by other synthetic methods. This approach was demonstrated to grow various nanocrystals such as BaTiO3 and β-Ga2O3 at room temperature.