Lin, Yiyang; Charchar, Patrick; Christofferson, Andrew J.; Thomas, Michael R.; Todorova, Nevena; Mazo, Manuel M.; Chen, Qu; Doutch, James; Richardson, Robert; Yarovsky, Irene; Stevens, Molly M.
Surface Dynamics and Ligand–Core Interactions of Quantum Sized Photoluminescent Gold Nanoclusters
Quantum-sized metallic clusters protected by biological ligands represent a new class of luminescent materials; yet the understanding of structural information and photoluminescence origin of these ultrasmall clusters remains a challenge. Herein we systematically study the surface ligand dynamics and ligand–metal core interactions of peptide-protected gold nanoclusters (AuNCs) with combined…
Atomic Layer Deposition of Space-Efficient SnO2 Underlayers for BiVO4 Host–Guest Architectures for Photoassisted Water Splitting
Lamm, Benjamin; Zhou, Lite; Rao, Pratap; Stefik, Morgan
Bismuth vanadate (BiVO4) is promising for solar-assisted water splitting. The performance of BiVO4 is limited by charge separation for >70 nm films or by light harvesting for
Well-defined metal-polymer nanocomposites: The interplay of structure, thermoplasmonics, and elastic mechanical properties
Reig, David Saleta; Hummel, Patrick; Wang, Zuyuan; Rosenfeldt, Sabine; Graczykowski, Bartlomiej; Retsch, Markus; Fytas, George
Metal-polymer nanocomposites are hybrid materials combining the superior plasmonic, electrical, and thermal properties of metals with the good elasticity and manufacturability of polymers. This renders metal-polymer nanocomposites promising candidates for conductive filler and coating applications, where mechanical properties are optothermally coupled. Here, we study the interplay of…
Highly Conducting, Transparent PEDOT:PSS Polymer Electrodes from Post-Treatment with Weak and Strong Acids
Bießmann, Lorenz; Saxena, Nitin; Hohn, Nuri; Hossain, Md Asjad; Veinot, Jonathan G. C.; Müller-Buschbaum, Peter
Abstract The origin of high conductivity in polymer electrodes based on poly(3,4-ethylene dioxythiophene):poly(styrene sulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) is investigated and the resilience against water exposure is tested. Post-treatment with weak and strong acids, namely, hydrochloric acid (HCl), formic acid (HCOOH), nitric acid (HNO3), and sulfuric acid (H2SO4), is performed and compared to…
Amphiphilic diblock copolymer-mediated structure control in nanoporous germanium-based thin films
Hohn, Nuri; Hetzenecker, Andreas E.; Giebel, Michael A.; Geier, Sebastian; Bießmann, Lorenz; Körstgens, Volker; Saxena, Nitin; Schlipf, Johannes; Ohm, Wiebke; Deimel, Peter S.; Allegretti, Francesco; Barth, Johannes V.; Roth, Stephan V.; Fässler, Thomas F.; Müller-Buschbaum, Peter
Fabrication of porous, foam-like germanium-based (Ge-based) nanostructures is achieved with the use of the amphiphilic diblock copolymer polystyrene-b-polyethylene oxide as structure directing agent. Basic concepts of block copolymer assisted sol–gel synthesis are successfully realized based on the 4− Zintl clusters as a precursor for Ge-based thin films. Material/elemental composition and…
Hydrogels composed of hyaluronic acid and dendritic ELPs: hierarchical structure and physical properties
Shmidov, Yulia; Zhou, Mingjun; Yosefi, Gal; Bitton, Ronit; Matson, John B.
Hydrogels that mimic the native extracellular matrix were prepared from hyaluronic acid (HA) and amine-terminated dendritic elastin-like peptides (denELPs) of generations 1, 2, and 3 (G1, 2, and 3) as crosslinking units. The physical properties of the hydrogels were investigated by rheology, scanning electron microscopy, swelling tests, small-angle X-ray scattering…
Synthesis and Characterization of a Regioregular Side-Chain Semifluorinated Polythiophene
Horn, Christoph; Pospiech, Doris; Zessin, Johanna; Stein, Sebastian; Jehnichen, Dieter; Komber, Hartmut; Göbel, Michael; Voit, Brigitte; Kiriy, Anton
The synthesis of a new side-chain semifluorinated thiophene monomer obtained by the reaction of 3-thiophene ethanol with 4,4,5,5,6,6,7,7,8,8,9,9,9-tridecafluorononan-1-ol is reported. The side-chain semifluorinated monomer is polymerized using Kumada catalyst-transfer polycondensation to obtain the regioregular side-chain semifluorinated thiophene polymer P3sfT with a sufficiently high molar mass…
Orthogonal Ambipolar Semiconductor Nanostructures for Complementary Logic Gates
Huang, Weiguo; Markwart, Jens C.; Briseno, Alejandro L.; Hayward, Ryan C.
We report orthogonal ambipolar semiconductors that exhibit hole and electron transport in perpendicular directions based on aligned films of nanocrystalline “shish-kebabs” containing poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT) and N,N′-di-n-octyl-3,4,9,10-perylenetetracarboxylic diimide (PDI) as p- and n-type components, respectively. Polarized optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, and X-ray…
Dramatic influence of patchy attractions on short-time protein diffusion under crowded conditions
Bucciarelli, Saskia; Myung, Jin Suk; Farago, Bela; Das, Shibananda; Vliegenthart, Gerard A.; Holderer, Olaf; Winkler, Roland G.; Schurtenberger, Peter; Gompper, Gerhard; Stradner, Anna
In the dense and crowded environment of the cell cytoplasm, an individual protein feels the presence of and interacts with all surrounding proteins. While we expect this to strongly influence the short-time diffusion coefficient Ds of proteins on length scales comparable to the nearest-neighbor distance, this quantity is difficult to…
Unusual Dynamics of Concentration Fluctuations in Solutions of Weakly Attractive Globular Proteins
Bucciarelli, Saskia; Casal-Dujat, Lucía; De Michele, Cristiano; Sciortino, Francesco; Dhont, Jan; Bergenholtz, Johan; Farago, Bela; Schurtenberger, Peter; Stradner, Anna
The globular protein γB-crystallin exhibits a complex phase behavior, where liquid–liquid phase separation characterized by a critical volume fraction ϕc = 0.154 and a critical temperature Tc = 291.8 K coexists with dynamical arrest on all length scales at volume fractions around ϕ ≈ 0.3–0.35, and an arrest line that…