Department of Chemistry, 2145 Sheridan Road, Evanston, IL 60208, USA.
Science. 2013 Sep 13;341(6151):1222-5. doi: 10.1126/science.1241402. Epub 2013 Aug 22.
The directed assembly of nanoparticle building blocks is a promising method for generating sophisticated three-dimensional materials by design. In this work, we have used DNA linkers to synthesize nanoparticle superlattices that have greater complexity than simple binary systems using the process of topotactic intercalation-the insertion of a third nanoparticle component at predetermined sites within a preformed binary lattice. Five distinct crystals were synthesized with this methodology, three of which have no equivalent in atomic or molecular crystals, demonstrating a general approach for assembling highly ordered ternary nanoparticle superlattices whose structures can be predicted before their synthesis. Additionally, the intercalation process was demonstrated to be completely reversible; the inserted nanoparticles could be expelled into solution by raising the temperature, and the ternary superlattice could be recovered by cooling.
通过设计将纳米粒子结构单元定向组装是一种很有前途的方法，可以生成复杂的三维材料。在这项工作中，我们使用 DNA 链接物合成了超晶格，其复杂性超过了简单的二元系统，使用的是拓扑插层过程——在预先形成的二元晶格中预定位置插入第三种纳米颗粒成分。使用这种方法合成了五个不同的晶体，其中三个在原子或分子晶体中没有等效物，证明了组装高度有序的三元纳米粒子超晶格的通用方法，其结构可以在合成之前预测。此外，插层过程被证明是完全可逆的；通过升高温度，可以将插入的纳米颗粒逐出溶液，并且可以通过冷却恢复三元超晶格。
