Proposal Number: CTS-0642217 Principal Investigator: Regan, Regina Affiliation: University of California-Irvine Proposal Title: SGER: Fabrication and Optimization of Highly Ordered Assemblies of Metallic Nanowire and Nanocrystal Arrays
Intellectual Merit:
The fabrication of noble metal nanostructures immobile on Si substrates via self-assembly with feature sizes less than 10 nm and more notable inter-particle spacing on the order of nanometers via a self-assembled template is unique to this proposal. This experimental study is combined with ab initio structural calculations of interfaces involved in phase aggregation that leads to nanostructure formation. Theory and experiment are combined in order to optimize structure and to apply these principles to obtain a variety of structures and vary material in the structure. Characterization of optical properties of nanostructures will be addressed to demonstrate the feasibility of using these structures in surface plasmon resonance biological sensors. Metal nanoparticles with diameters much less than the wavelength of light and narrow inter-particle spacing have strong near field coupling due to a local enhancement of the electromagnetic field around these particles. Thus, in order to achieve maximum enhancement to the electromagnetic signal, the inter-particle spacing should be on the order of nanometers. By using self-assembly, the feature size, 8 nm, and inter-particle spacing achievable, ~10 nm, is smaller than that obtained with electron beam lithography and the throughput is much higher.
Broader Impacts:
The approach proposed uses self-assembly as a low-cost method to fabricate nanostructure arrays composed of noble metal nanocrystals and nanowires. The development and fundamental understanding of fabricating large-areas of uniformly-sized ensembles of noble metal nanocrystals and nanowires and investigating an efficient readout method will foster the emergence of low-cost and highly sensitive biosensing devices in addition to other applications such as transport of electromagnetic energy along metallic nanowires, and catalysis. This proposal will support the training of undergraduate and graduate students in a highly interdisciplinary area of science. Interest and experience in science and engineering will also be fostered via curriculum development, computer simulations and experimental data from this project incorporated in undergraduate and graduate courses.
