Specific functionalization of CTAB stabilized anisotropic gold nanoparticles with polypeptides for folding-mediated self-assembly

Anisotropic nanoparticles stabilized by cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) are notoriously difficult to homogenously functionalize using conventional gold-thiol chemistry. Using surface assisted laser desorption time of flight mass spectroscopy and scanning transmission electron microscopy-energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, we demonstrate that silver species adsorbed on the particle surface prevent effective surface functionalization. When covered by a thin gold film, particle functionalization was drastically improved. A thiol-containing polypeptide was immobilized on arrowhead gold nanorods (NRs) and was subsequently able to selectively heteroassociate with a complementary polypeptide resulting in a folding-mediated bridging aggregation of the NRs. Despite using arrowhead NRs with a pronounced difference in surface arrangement on the {111} facets on the arrowheads compared to the {100} facets at the particle sides, the polypeptides were efficiently and homogeneously immobilized on the particles after gold film overgrowth.