Advanced Science Research Center at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, 85 St Nicholas Terrace, New York, NY, 10031, USA.
Department of Chemistry, Hunter College, 695 Park Ave, New York, NY, 10065, USA.
Nat Commun. 2020 Mar 6;11(1):1244. doi: 10.1038/s41467-020-14990-x.
Polymer brush patterns have a central role in established and emerging research disciplines, from microarrays and smart surfaces to tissue engineering. The properties of these patterned surfaces are dependent on monomer composition, polymer height, and brush distribution across the surface. No current lithographic method, however, is capable of adjusting each of these variables independently and with micrometer-scale resolution. Here we report a technique termed Polymer Brush Hypersurface Photolithography, which produces polymeric pixels by combining a digital micromirror device (DMD), an air-free reaction chamber, and microfluidics to independently control monomer composition and polymer height of each pixel. The printer capabilities are demonstrated by preparing patterns from combinatorial polymer and block copolymer brushes. Images from polymeric pixels are created using the light reflected from a DMD to photochemically initiate atom-transfer radical polymerization from initiators immobilized on Si/SiO wafers. Patterning is combined with high-throughput analysis of grafted-from polymerization kinetics, accelerating reaction discovery, and optimization of polymer coatings.
聚合物刷图案在微阵列和智能表面到组织工程等既定和新兴研究领域中具有核心作用。这些图案表面的性能取决于单体组成、聚合物高度以及刷在表面上的分布。然而，目前没有任何光刻方法能够独立地以亚微米级分辨率调整这些变量。在这里，我们报告了一种称为聚合物刷超表面光刻的技术，该技术通过结合数字微镜器件 (DMD)、无气反应室和微流控技术来独立控制每个像素的单体组成和聚合物高度，从而生成聚合物像素。通过使用 DMD 反射光来光化学引发固定在 Si/SiO 晶片上的引发剂的原子转移自由基聚合，从而展示了打印机的功能。图案是通过将高分辨率的从引发剂上接枝的聚合动力学分析与图案形成相结合来实现的，这加速了反应发现和聚合物涂层的优化。
