Published in Nano letters
Metallic nanowires (Au, Ag, Cu, Ni, Co, and Rh) with an average diameter of 40 nm and a length of 3-5 μm have been fabricated by electrodeposition in the pores of track-etched polycarbonate membranes. Structural characterizations by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and electron diffraction showed that nanowires of Au, Ag, and Cu are single-cr...
Published in Nano letters
High-performance supercomputing and high-fidelity atomistic methods are used to study the shape effects on the single-particle electronic states of nanocrystals. We found that the shape can be used as an efficient way to control the electronic structures of the nanocrystals. Changing the shape is more flexible and provides more variety of electroni...
Published in Nano letters
Because of its ability to create structures of nanoscale dimension with large aggregate particle surface area-to-volume ratios, nanotechnology offers new opportunities to treat drug poisonings. Emulsion-based nanoparticles (diameter: 118.4 nm) extracted bupivacaine from the aqueous phase in a physiological salt solution and attenuated the drug's ca...
Published in Nano letters
An effective approach is demonstrated for growing large-area, hexagonally patterned, aligned ZnO nanorods. The synthesis uses a catalyst template produced by a self-assembled monolayer of submicron spheres and guided vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) growth on a single crystal alumina substrate. The ZnO nanorods have uniform shape and length, align vertical...
Published in Nano letters
We report the use of chemically modified carbon nanotubes as a substrate for cultured neurons. The morphological features of neurons that directly reflect their potential capability in synaptic transmission are characterized. The chemical properties of carbon nanotubes are systematically varied by attaching different functional groups that confer k...
Published in Nano letters
Atomic layer deposition of alumina enhanced the molecule sensing characteristics of fabricated nanopores by fine-tuning their surface properties, reducing 1/f noise, neutralizing surface charge to favor capture of DNA and other negative polyelectrolytes, and controlling the diameter and aspect ratio of the pores with near single Ångstrom precision....
Published in Nano letters
It was hypothesized that nanoscale adhesion ligand spacing regulates cell adhesion, proliferation, and differentiation, and that this control can be decoupled from the overall ligand density. Alginate was chemically modified with a peptide containing the cell adhesion sequence arginine-glycine-aspartic acid (RGD), and the nanoscale spacing of RGD l...
Published in Nano letters
DNA and protein have been extensively scrutinized for feasibility as parts in nanotechnology, but another natural building block, RNA, has been largely ignored. RNA can be manipulated to form versatile shapes, thus providing an element of adaptability to DNA nanotechnology, which is predominantly based upon a double-helical structure. The DNA-packa...
Published in Nano letters
The design of artificial molecular machines is complicated because the mechanics used in macromachines is not readily adaptable for nano environments. We constructed a semi-artificial molecular device, which contains a naturally occurring molecular machine-a vaccinia virus encoded protein-linked with an artificial part. The self-assembled construct...
Published in Nano letters
A class of highly fluorescent and photostable core-shell nanoparticles from a modified Stober synthesis in the size range of 20-30 nm is described. These nanoparticles are monodisperse in solution, 20 times brighter, and more photostable than their constituent fluorophore, and are amenable to specific labeling of biological macromolecules for bioim...
