ALD of L-Alanine Polypeptide by Sandia, University of New Mexico and Angstrom Thin Film Tech

Atomic Layer Deposition of l-Alanine Polypeptide

 

Yaqin Fu, Binsong Li, Ying-Bing Jiang, Darren R. Dunphy, Andy Tsai, Siu-Yue Tam, Hongyou Fan, Hongxia Zhang, David Rogers, Susan Rempe, Plamen Atanassov, Joseph L. Cecchi, and C. Jeffrey Brinker

J. Am. Chem. Soc., Article ASAP, DOI: 10.1021/ja5043403, Publication Date (Web): October 30, 2014

l-Alanine polypeptide thin films were synthesized via atomic layer deposition (ALD). Instead of using an amino acid monomer as the precursor, an l-alanine amino acid derivatized with a protecting group was used to prevent self-polymerization, increase the vapor pressure, and allow linear cycle-by-cycle growth emblematic of ALD. The successful deposition of a conformal polypeptide film has been confirmed by FTIR, TEM, and Mass Spectrometry, and the ALD process has been extended to polyvaline.