Gold-Nanoparticle-Assisted Self-Assembly of Chemical Gradients with Tunable Sub-50 nm Molecular Domains

A simple and efficient principle for nanopatterning with wide applicability in the sub-50 nanometer regime is chemisorption of nanoparticles; at homogeneous substrates, particles carrying surface charge may spontaneously self-organize due to the electrostatic repulsion between adjacent particles. Guided by this principle, a method is presented to design, self-assemble, and chemically functionalize gradient nanopatterns where the size of molecular domains can be tuned to match the level corresponding to single protein binding events. To modulate the binding of negatively charged gold nanoparticles both locally (<100 nm) and globally (>100 m) onto a single modified gold substrate, ion diffusion is used to achieve spatial control of the particles' mutual electrostatic interactions. By subsequent tailoring of different molecules to surface-immobilized particles and the void areas surrounding them, nanopatterns are obtained with variable chemical domains along the gradient surface. Fimbriated Escherichia coli bacteria are bound to gradient nanopatterns with similar molecular composition and macroscopic contact angle, but different sizes of nanoscopic presentation of adhesive (hydrophobic) and repellent poly(ethylene) glycol (PEG) domains. It is shown that small hydrophobic domains, similar in size to the diameter of the bacterial fimbriae, supported firmly attached bacteria resembling catch-bond binding, whereas a high number of loosely adhered bacteria are observed on larger hydrophobic domains.