High-speed dynamic-mode atomic force microscopy imaging of polymers: an adaptive multiloop-mode approach

• Juan Ren and
• Qingze Zou

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1563–1570, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.158

• and evaluation of the AMLM technique by imaging three types of polymer samples different in both topography features and heterogeneous mechanical properties. The three samples, made of polystyrene–low-density polyethylene (PS–LDPE), styrene–butadiene–styrene (SBS) and celgard, respectively, have over

Luminescent supramolecular hydrogels from a tripeptide and nitrogen-doped carbon nanodots

• Maria C. Cringoli,
• Slavko Kralj,
• Marina Kurbasic,
• Massimo Urban and
• Silvia Marchesan

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1553–1562, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.157

• immediately put on wells of Greiner 96 U Bottom Black Polystyrene. The controls were used in 200 μL total volume. After 1 h, the fluorescence emission spectra were acquired using a Tecan Infinite M1000 pro, with a bandwidth of 10 nm, selecting the following excitation (ex.) and emission (em.) wavelengths: ex

• calculated and plotted. Thioflavin T fluorescence assay Gel precursor solutions were prepared as described above and 100 μL of each buffer were immediately put on wells of Greiner 96 U Bottom Black Polystyrene. The controls were used in 200 μL total volume. After 1 h, 20 μL of a solution of thioflavin T

Parylene C as a versatile dielectric material for organic field-effect transistors

• Tomasz Marszalek,
• Maciej Gazicki-Lipman and
• Jacek Ulanski

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1532–1545, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.155

• energy exhibited a mobility of μ = 0.006 cm2/V·s. More detailed studies were carried out for tetracene semiconductor films deposited on various dielectric materials, namely organic polystyrene (PS), Parylene C, and poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) as well as on inorganic SiO2, with and without HMDS

Calcium fluoride based multifunctional nanoparticles for multimodal imaging

• Marion Straßer,
• Joachim H. X. Schrauth,
• Sofia Dembski,
• Daniel Haddad,
• Bernd Ahrens,
• Stefan Schweizer,
• Bastian Christ,
• Alevtina Cubukova,
• Marco Metzger,
• Heike Walles,
• Peter M. Jakob and
• Gerhard Sextl

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1484–1493, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.148

• redispersed in DMEM with 10% FCS. The sedimentation studies over 24 h were carried out by monitoring the absorbance at 700 nm as a function of time (Shimadzu, UV-3100). The sample (5 mg·mL−1 NPs in DMEM with 10% FCS, with or without Melpers®2450) was placed into a polystyrene micro cuvette and the absorbance

Low uptake of silica nanoparticles in Caco-2 intestinal epithelial barriers

• Dong Ye,
• Mattia Bramini,
• Delyan R. Hristov,
• Sha Wan,
• Anna Salvati,
• Christoffer Åberg and
• Kenneth A. Dawson

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1396–1406, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.141

• cells, rather than Caco-2 barriers, interestingly, there are suggestions that the response is different in overnight cultures and cells grown for 10 days [25]. Uptake into Caco-2 cells has been reported for silica [23][24][26][28], polystyrene [29], chitosan [30], poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) [31][32

• nanoparticles such as microporous silicon [22], silica [23], poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) [33] and carboxylated and aminated polystyrene [34]. We hypothesize that the low translocation observed in Caco-2 barriers results from a low uptake into the cells, an uptake that depends on cellular differentiation and

• transport across it. The low degree of internalisation is particularly striking in comparison to our previous observations of a substantial uptake of silica nanoparticles into (single) lung cells [37]. Moreover, we have previously found sizable uptake of silica and polystyrene nanoparticles into another

Micro- and nano-surface structures based on vapor-deposited polymers

• Hsien-Yeh Chen

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1366–1374, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.138

• ) surface and a poly(4-ethynyl-p-xylylene-co-p-xylylene) surface, respectively. Various substrates were successfully verified for the coating and patterning modifications: metal (silver, titanium, stainless steel), polystyrene (PS), poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA), silicon, glass, poly(dimethylsiloxane

• range of different substrates, and the nanopatterns were demonstrated on polystyrene, acrylic and PDMS in this work [27]. The aforementioned photolithographical or soft-lithographical methods are simple and straightforward to perform. However, because of the limitation of applying a photomask or an

Miniemulsion copolymerization of (meth)acrylates in the presence of functionalized multiwalled carbon nanotubes for reinforced coating applications

• Bertha T. Pérez-Martínez,
• Lorena Farías-Cepeda,
• Víctor M. Ovando-Medina,
• José M. Asua,
• Lucero Rosales-Marines and
• Radmila Tomovska

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1328–1337, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.134

• period and does not require massive diffusion of the components of the formulation through the aqueous phase. Ham et al. [32][33] used a so-called miniemulsion process in an attempt to cover SWCNTs with polystyrene nanoparticles, where n-pentanol was used as a hydrophobe to minimize Ostwald ripening

Synthesis of [Fe(L_eq)(L_ax)]_n coordination polymer nanoparticles using blockcopolymer micelles

• Christoph Göbel,
• Ottokar Klimm,
• Florian Puchtler,
• Sabine Rosenfeldt,
• Stephan Förster and
• Birgit Weber

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1318–1327, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.133

• temperature. Applications demand compounds with defined properties concerning the size and switchability that are maintained when the compound is integrated into composite materials. Here, we report the synthesis of [Fe(Leq)(Lax)]n coordination polymer (CP) nanoparticles using self-assembled polystyrene-block

• used the block copolymer polystyrene-b-poly(4-vinylpyridine) (PS-b-P4VP) to prepare spherical nanoparticles of the 1D spin-crossover coordination polymer [FeLeq(bipy)]n. We were able control the crystallinity of the [FeLeq(bipy)]n core through successive addition of starting material and by variation

• argon 5.0 (purity ≥ 99.999%) and Schlenk technique. The synthesis of all samples was repeated at least twice. Polystyrene-b-poly(4-vinylpyridine) (PS-P4VP, purum, MW ≈ 150.000) was synthesised as described before [15]. 1,2-di(pyridin-4-yl)ethane) (bpea) and trans-1,2-di(pyridin-4-yl)ethene (bpee) were

Nano-engineered skin mesenchymal stem cells: potential vehicles for tumour-targeted quantum-dot delivery

• Liga Saulite,
• Dominyka Dapkute,
• Karlis Pleiko,
• Ineta Popena,
• Simona Steponkiene,
• Ricardas Rotomskis and
• Una Riekstina

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1218–1230, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.123

• QD uptake in skin MSCs. The composition of the protein corona could either enhance or decrease the cellular uptake of polystyrene-based NPs, depending on nanoparticle functionalization [47]. We have showed that NP uptake in skin MSCs is an active process and does not occur passively. For the

• of 5 × 104 cells per well in a 12-well tissue culture polystyrene plate and labelled with QDs at various concentrations in the range of 0.5 to 64 nM for 6 h in complete or serum-free medium. To determine the accumulation dynamics, 8 nM or 16 nM QDs were applied to MSCs and incubated for 0.5, 1, 3, 6

Preparation of thick silica coatings on carbon fibers with fine-structured silica nanotubes induced by a self-assembly process

• Benjamin Baumgärtner,
• Hendrik Möller,
• Thomas Neumann and
• Dirk Volkmer

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1145–1155, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.116

• hydrophobic polystyrene substrate. Treatment of polystyrene with sulfuric acid introduces sulfonate groups, and thus the possibility for hydrogen-bonding between –NH and –SO3H. The modified polystyrene surface is suitable for the nanograss formation demonstrating the importance of sufficient molecular-level

Hierarchically structured nanoporous carbon tubes for high pressure carbon dioxide adsorption

• Julia Patzsch,
• Deepu J. Babu and
• Jörg J. Schneider

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1135–1144, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.115

• synthesized by a combination of the Stoeber process and the use of electrospun macrosized polystyrene fibres as structure directing templates. The obtained carbon tubes have a macroporous nature characterized by a thick wall structure and a high specific surface area of approximately 500 m²/g resulting from

• material. Experimental Materials Polystyrene (PS, pro-plast from BASF), tetraethylorthosilicate (TEOS, ABCR), ammonia (NH3, Grüssing), dimethylformamide (DMF, Merck), tetrahydrofuran (THF, Merck), and ethanol (EtOH, Brenntag) were used as received without further purification. Synthesis of polystyrene

• fibres (1) In a similar manner as described in [38], electrospinning was performed in a homebuilt apparatus. Polystyrene (PS) fibres were electrospun from a 16 wt % PS THF/DMF 3:2 solution. After aging the spinning solution overnight, it was loaded into a glass syringe equipped with a stainless-steel

Needs and challenges for assessing the environmental impacts of engineered nanomaterials (ENMs)

• Michelle Romero-Franco,
• Hilary A. Godwin,
• Muhammad Bilal and
• Yoram Cohen

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 989–1014, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.101

Functional dependence of resonant harmonics on nanomechanical parameters in dynamic mode atomic force microscopy

• Federico Gramazio,
• Matteo Lorenzoni,
• Francesc Pérez-Murano,
• Enrique Rull Trinidad,
• Urs Staufer and
• Jordi Fraxedas

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 883–891, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.90

• frequency and polystyrene samples [13]. Such study has provided a practical qualitative method to continuously monitor changes in the shape and radius of a cantilever tip in amplitude modulation AFM mode. Here, we will also focus on the 6th harmonic since it provides the larger amplitude, but the

Nanostructured carbon materials decorated with organophosphorus moieties: synthesis and application

• Giacomo Biagiotti,
• Vittoria Langè,
• Cristina Ligi,
• Stefano Caporali,
• Maurizio Muniz-Miranda,
• Anna Flis,
• K. Michał Pietrusiewicz,
• Giacomo Ghini,
• Alberto Brandi and
• Stefano Cicchi

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 485–493, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.52

• ] and, recently, also triphenylphosphine oxide (TPPO) have found similar application [21][22][23][24]. Despite their utility, very few examples of heterogeneous catalysts are described. One example was reported by Tang, who developed a phosphine oxide derivative linked to a polystyrene resin [25]. For

Methods for preparing polymer-decorated single exchange-biased magnetic nanoparticles for application in flexible polymer-based films

• Laurence Ourry,
• Delphine Toulemon,
• Souad Ammar and
• Fayna Mammeri

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 408–417, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.43

• ) or polystyrene (PS), using radical-controlled polymerization under various processing conditions. We compared the influence of the synthesis parameters on the structural and microstructural properties of the resulting hybrid systems, with special emphasis on significantly reducing their mutual

• resulting nanohybrids can be considered as valuable building blocks for flexible, magnetic polymer-based devices. Keywords: assembly; ATRP; magnetic nanoparticle; exchange-bias; films; functionalization; polymerization; poly(methyl methacrylate); polystyrene; seed-mediated growth; surface; Introduction

• and aggregation as far as possible in the first stage of polymer grafting, mechanical stirring and dilute suspensions of reactants were used, even if the functionalization of large amounts of particles becomes difficult. We specifically graft poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) and polystyrene (PS

Template-controlled piezoactivity of ZnO thin films grown via a bioinspired approach

• Nina J. Blumenstein,
• Fabian Streb,
• Stefan Walheim,
• Thomas Schimmel,
• Zaklina Burghard and
• Joachim Bill

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 296–303, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.32

• water-free reaction solution. The first template is a carboxy-terminated SAM, the second consists of a PEL with polystyrene sulfonate (PSS) as a top layer. The grown ZnO thin films are characterized with piezoresponse force microscopy (PFM) to investigate the influence of the templates on the

Streptavidin-coated gold nanoparticles: critical role of oligonucleotides on stability and fractal aggregation

• Roberta D'Agata,
• Pasquale Palladino and
• Giuseppe Spoto

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 1–11, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.1

• or 0.22 µm pore size membrane. Samples (1 mL) were transferred into a disposable polystyrene cuvette for DLS measurements while a folded capillary cell was used for ζ-potential measurements. The concentration of solutions (0.1–1 nM) was adjusted to accommodate scattering properties of samples and

Intercalation and structural aspects of macroRAFT agents into MgAl layered double hydroxides

• Dessislava Kostadinova,
• Ana Cenacchi Pereira,
• Muriel Lansalot,
• Franck D’Agosto,
• Elodie Bourgeat-Lami,
• Fabrice Leroux,
• Christine Taviot-Guého,
• Sylvian Cadars and
• Vanessa Prevot

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2016, 7, 2000–2012, doi:10.3762/bjnano.7.191

• ) polymerization [43] in the LDH matrix. This resulted in an exfoliated LDH/polystyrene nanocomposite with a good control of the molar mass of the polystyrene chains. Recently, we reported that highly stable dispersions at elevated macroRAFT copolymer concentrations [44] could be obtained by adsorbing statistical

• number-average molar mass (Mn) and dispersity (Đ = Mw/Mn), with Mw: weight-average molar mass) were derived from the RI signal using a calibration curve based on polystyrene standards (from Polymer Laboratories) [53]. Table 1 presents the main characteristics of the well-defined polymers obtained with a

Facile fabrication of luminescent organic dots by thermolysis of citric acid in urea melt, and their use for cell staining and polyelectrolyte microcapsule labelling

• Nadezhda M. Zholobak,
• Anton L. Popov,
• Alexander B. Shcherbakov,
• Nelly R. Popova,
• Mykhailo M. Guzyk,
• Valeriy P. Antonovich,
• Alla V. Yegorova,
• Yuliya V. Scrypynets,
• Inna I. Leonenko,
• Alexander Ye. Baranchikov and
• Vladimir K. Ivanov

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2016, 7, 1905–1917, doi:10.3762/bjnano.7.182

• made by adsorption of the positively charged poly allylamine hydrochloride (PAH) from 1 mg/mL solution in 0.15 M NaCl (15 min of incubation and shaking) on CaCO3 microparticles dispersed in this solution. The second layer was prepared by absorption of the negatively charged polystyrene sulfonate (PSS

Numerical investigation of depth profiling capabilities of helium and neon ions in ion microscopy

• Patrick Philipp,
• Lukasz Rzeznik and
• Tom Wirtz

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2016, 7, 1749–1760, doi:10.3762/bjnano.7.168

• damage formation. The emission of H2, CH4, C2H2, C3H5, etc. has been observed for 100 keV He+ and 200 keV Ar+ bombardment of polyethylene (PE) and polystyrene (PS) [14]. Similarly, H2, C2H2, CO and CO2 are typically emitted from implanted PI [15]. The degassing leads to an increase of the carbon

• polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE), polystyrene (PS) or poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA). For samples 1 to 3, layers 1 and 5 have a thickness of 20 nm while the remaining layers have a thickness of 10 nm. For samples 4 and 6, layers 1, 3 and 6 are 20 nm thick, layers 2 and 4 are 10 nm thick and layer 5 is 40 nm thick. The

Graphene-enhanced plasmonic nanohole arrays for environmental sensing in aqueous samples

• Christa Genslein,
• Peter Hausler,
• Eva-Maria Kirchner,
• Rudolf Bierl,
• Antje J. Baeumner and
• Thomas Hirsch

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2016, 7, 1564–1573, doi:10.3762/bjnano.7.150

• that this type of plasticizers adsorbs on polystyrene resins by multiple adsorbent–adsorbate interactions such as hydrogen bonding and π-stacking [38], which makes them an ideal analyte for the evaluation of the graphene-modified gold surfaces in SPR. Nanostructured surfaces are promising in enhancing

• method described by Masson et al. [39][40]. Drop casting of the polystyrene particles on a clean glass slide leads to a densely packed monolayer on the substrate (Figure 2). The sphere mask consists of ordered areas of several square millimetres covering more than the optical spot size of the SPR device

• polystyrene particles on a clean and dry glass slide. The polystyrene particles have a diameter of 1.04 μm (SD = 0.04 μm, microparticles GmbH). Covering with a Petri dish allows a slow evaporation rate, resulting in a close-packed monolayer. The sphere masks were dried overnight. In order to create a nanohole

Polystyrene-block-poly(ethylene oxide) copolymers as templates for stacked, spherical large-mesopore silica coatings: dependence of silica pore size on the PS/PEO ratio

• Roberto Nisticò,
• Giuliana Magnacca,
• Sushilkumar A. Jadhav and
• Dominique Scalarone

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2016, 7, 1454–1460, doi:10.3762/bjnano.7.137

• narrow pore size distribution and high porosity have been obtained by a sol–gel reaction of a silicon oxide precursor (TEOS) and using polystyrene-block-poly(ethylene oxide) (PS-b-PEO) copolymers as templates in an acidic environment. PS-b-PEO copolymers with different molecular weight and composition

• block copolymers, such as polystyrene-block-poly(ethylene oxide) (PS-b-PEO), have been successfully employed to synthetize mesoporous oxides [19][25]. Starting from these previous works, we decided to develop a systematic study to gain better control on the morphological features of templated silica

Three-gradient regular solution model for simple liquids wetting complex surface topologies

• Sabine Akerboom,
• Marleen Kamperman and
• Frans A. M. Leermakers

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2016, 7, 1377–1396, doi:10.3762/bjnano.7.129

Tunable longitudinal modes in extended silver nanoparticle assemblies

• Serene S. Bayram,
• Klas Lindfors and
• Amy Szuchmacher Blum

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2016, 7, 1219–1228, doi:10.3762/bjnano.7.113

• , end-to-end (via the polystyrene-capped (111) facet) assembly was noticed for more hydrophilic solvent combinations [42]. This helps to understand the role of water in the growth of the AgNPs–cysteamine assemblies under study. The poorer affinity of “heavy” cysteamine to the solvent (light water

Reasons and remedies for the agglomeration of multilayered graphene and carbon nanotubes in polymers

• Rasheed Atif and
• Fawad Inam

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2016, 7, 1174–1196, doi:10.3762/bjnano.7.109

• properties using TEM in polystyrene–1 wt % MWNT. They have reported a 42% increase in breaking strength, which is an indication of strong interfacial adhesion [144]. The trend for strength and modulus with varying content of CSCNT loading is shown in Figure 15 [141]. It can be seen that mechanical properties