Nanoscale biomolecular structures on self assembled monolayers generated from modular pegylated disulfides.
A solid phase synthetic strategy was developed that uses modular building blocks to prepare symmetric oligo(ethylene glycol) terminated disulfides with a variety of lengths and terminal functionalities. The modular disulfides, composed of alkyl amino groups linked by an amide group to oligoethylene chains were used to generate self assembled monolayers (SAMs) which were characterised to determine their applicability for biomolecular applications. X ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) of the SAMs obtained from these molecules demonstrated improved stability towards displacement by 16 hexadecanethiol, while surface plasmon resonance (SPR) analyses of SAMs prepared with the hydroxy terminated oligoethylene disulfide showed equal resistance to non specific protein adsorption in comparison to 11 mercaptoundecyl tri(ethylene glycol) SAMs made from these adsorbates were amenable to nanoscale patterning by scanning near field photolithography (SNP) facilitating the fabrication of nanopatterned, protein functionalised surfaces. Such SAMs may be further developed for bionanotechnology applications such as the fabrication of nanoscale biological arrays and sensor devices.
Chemistry