Process for Ultranarrow Inorganic Nanowire Assembly on Noncovalent Template

Orientating anisotropic nanostructures at interfaces during device fabrication has been known to be a significant challenge. Researchers at Purdue University have developed a process for designing flexible ulta-narrow gold wires on a noncovalent template. Designs inspired by nature principles create minimal polar environments that exhibit membrane-mimetic dipole orientation behavior, impacting orientation of objects in nonpolar surroundings over relatively long distances. This technology demonstrates that striped phases of horizontally-oriented phospholipids presenting 1 nm wide orientable dipole arrays can order and straighten flexible 2 nm diameter gold nanowires with lengths greater than 1 µm which greatly exceeds the template pitch of around 7 nm. This technology ultimately assist in the design of devices or nano-electronic devises with high feature densities.

Advantages:

-Orientate nanostructures

-Flexible electronics

Potential Applications:

-Electronic Devices

Publication: One Nanometer Wide Functional Patterns with a Sub-10 Nanometer Pitch Transferred to an Amorphous Elastomeric Material.

DOI: 10.1021/acsnano.0c08741

TRL: 3

Intellectual Property:

Keywords: Nanostructures, anisotropic nanostructures, flexible electronics, nano-electronic devices, gold nanowires, dipole arrays, noncovalent template, device fabrication, high feature densities, phospholipids, Chemistry and Chemical Analysis, Materials and Manufacturing, Nano-electronics