Doctoral Researchers

Supervisors: Ralf Seidel, Yana Vaynzof, Artur Erbe

A challenge for the bottom-up fabrication of nanoelectronic devices is the accurate spacially-resolved material deposition on the nanometer scale. In the field of biomolecular materials, DNA nanotechnology overcomes this challenge by being highly precise at building DNA structures of nearly any desired form. To exploit this concept for other materials, we recently developed a DNA origami mold-based nanoparticle synthesis scheme that allows the fabrication of metallic nanoparticles with DNA-programmable shape. Particularly, we demonstrated the fabrication of gold nanostructures with aspect ratios of up to 7 grown from single seeds [1] as well as the fabrication of rolling-pin-, dumbbell-, loop- and T-shaped gold nanoparticles [2].

Figure 1: Scheme of the seeded growth protocol: pre-synthesized gold nanoparticles are functionalized with ssDNA oligos and loaded inside of DNA origami molds. Due to specific interfaces the molds can form superstructures of controlled lengths. A subsequent growth step allows for the synthesis of silver metal nanostructures of defined shapes.

Now, I expand the mold-based fabrication method to new materials, starting with silver (Figure 1). By using silver, we can create nanowires with better conducting properties and meet more diverse requirements in nanoelectronics, for example altering the Schottky barrier. Additionally, combining different materials in one DNA superstructure will allow us in the future to create multi-metallic structures with unique electrical properties. Therefore, as next step I will focus on semiconducting and magnetic materials to diversify our construction kit.

[1] Jingjing Ye, Richard Weichelt, Ulrich Kemper, Vaibhav Gupta, Tobias A. F. König, Alexander Eychmüller, and Ralf Seidel. Small 2020, 16(39), 2003662.

[2] Jingjing Ye, Olha Aftenieva, Türkan Bayrak, Archa Jain, Tobias A. F. König, Artur Erbe, and Ralf Seidel. Advanced Materials 2021, 2100381.