Controlled growth of nano- and bio-arrays on patterned substrates

Bio- and nano-material arrays have attracted significant attention due to their importance in a number of research and application fields, such as biology, sensors, devices, etc. How to generate these arrays in a controlled manner is critical. In this talk, we introduce several methods developed in our group to show how to control the growth of bio- and nanoarrays on patterned solid substrates. By using dip-pen nanolithography (DPN), the polyamidoamine (PAMAM) dendrimers were patterned on solid substrates, which were successfully used as templates for controlled growth of peptide nanoarrays. The Co nanoparticle patterns, generated on solid substrates by DPN, were used as catalyst for controlled growth of single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) arrays. In order to increase the throughput of the generated patterns and save the pattering time, although the multi-pen DPN [4a,b] and polymer-pen lithography [4c] can be used, recently we developed a facile ¿needle-scratching¿ method (NSM) to generate large-area catalyst patterns on solid substrates at nearly no cost, which were successfully used for growth of densely aligned SWCNT arrays. We believe that this simple method could open up an avenue for fast, cheap and large-area fabrication of CNT-based nanodevices.