Self-Functionalizing Polymer Film Surfaces Assisted by Specific Polystyrene End-Tagging

Abstract

Polo Scientifico e Tecnologico (PTS), CNR, via Fantoli 16/15, Two simple approaches to build up micropatterned functionalized polymer films are reported here. Both of them are based on the formation of porous films consisting of two-dimensionally ordered void structures, produced by evaporation of a polymer solution in the presence of humidity. In the first approach, we utilize an amino-terminated linear polystyrene to fabricate honeycomb structured films in which the cavities are enriched with amino groups that preserve their chemical reactivity. This allows, in principle, to obtain films with different surface functionality by simply changing the chain-end of the polymer used. In the second approach, we synthesize a luminescent chain-ended polystyrene to show how the honeycomb structures can be easily transformed, by a thermal treatment, into flat micropatterned fluorescent films. Both the microporous and the flat micropatterned films resulting from this study are attractive materials since the chemical functions distributed on their surface can further react with other molecules to provide a more complex array suitable for biological tests.

Droplet condensation on polymer surfaces: A review

“…Both of the films can be used in biological tests reacting with other molecules to create more complex structured arrays. 172 Hirai et al created biomimetic bifunctional surfaces having antireflective and superhydrophobic properties using honeycomb structured PS and polyacrylamide derivative films as dry-etching masks. Their flexible nature opens up an application area for curved surfaces.…”

Breath Figures: Fabrication of Honeycomb Porous Films Induced by Marangoni Instabilities

“…Alternatively, the porous films can be functionalized by post-modification reactions giving the possibility to introduce a wide range of functionalities into the pores. Taking the advantage of the in-situ functionalization, BF patterns can be obtained from materials containing ligands [75], reactive groups [161] or initiator sites [162] located within in the cavities for further chemical reactions or polymerization step.…”

“…In both cases, light-sensitive honeycomb films based on semi-conductive NPs or conjugated polymers were used to improve the opto-electronic properties of organic thinfilm devices [126,161,174,176,[190][191][192].…”

Polymer Surfaces in Motion

“…Alternatively, the porous films can be functionalized by post-modification reactions giving the possibility to introduce a wide range of functionalities into the pores. Taking the advantage of the in-situ functionalization, BF patterns can be obtained from materials containing ligands [75], reactive groups [161] or initiator sites [162] located within in the cavities for further chemical reactions or polymerization step.…”

“…In both cases, light-sensitive honeycomb films based on semi-conductive NPs or conjugated polymers were used to improve the opto-electronic properties of organic thinfilm devices [126,161,174,176,[190][191][192].…”