Surface-Confined Nanoparticles as Substrates for Photopolymerizable Self-Assembled Monolayers

Constraints on substrate size and shape are minimized in the fully solution-based approach to surface fabrication reported here. It is shown that not only is it possible to prepare self-assembled monolayers of a diacetylene compound on colloidal gold nanoparticles that are adsorbed onto supported organic films, but also subsequent polymerization yields highly conjugated poly(diacetylene). The ability to fabricate nanosized gold particles coated with conjugated polymers holds interesting possibilities for applications in nonlinear optics and electronics.