Nanomanufacturing of Gold Nanoparticle Arrays Using Peptide-Derivatized Block Copolymer Templates

Collective surface plasmons (SPs) displayed by two-dimensional (2-D) Au nanostructures are important for applications such as plasmonics and plasmonic sensing. However, methods for fabricating programmable highly-ordered arrays of Au nanoparticles with nanoscale precision are limited. Here, we report a peptide---derivated block copolymer based rout towards continuous fabrication of Au nanoparticle superlatice with tunable structures. We successfully obtain discrete, hexagonally-packed Au nanoparticle hierarchical structures where Au-to-Au nanoparticle spacing is precisely controlled by the underlying PMMA cylindrical phase of the block copolymer (BCP). Dynamic thermal field processing techniques offer a facile and continuous rout to tune the BCP assembly, thus enabling versatile arrangement of Au nanostructures from Au-dots to Au-lines. Our method may open a cost-effective way towards assembly of 2-D Au nanoparticles with tunable structures by carefully tuning molecular parameters -- a promising step to novel nanodevices.