title: Single conical nanopores displaying pH-tunable rectifying characteristics. manipulating ionic transport with zwitterionic polymer brushes.
abstract: In this work we describe for the first time the integration of "smart" polymer brushes into single conical nanopores to obtain a new highly functional signal-responsive chemical nanodevice. The responsive brushes were constituted of zwitterionic monomers whose charge is regulated via pH changes in the environmental conditions. The pH-dependent chemical equilibrium of the monomer units provides a fine-tuning of the ionic transport though the nanopore by simply presetting the pH of the electrolyte solution. Our results demonstrate that this strategy enables a higher degree of control over the rectification properties when compared to the nanochannels modified with charged monolayer assemblies. We envision that these results will create completely new avenues to build-up "smart" nanodevices using responsive polymer brushes integrated into single conical nanopores.
authors.affiliation: Max-Planck-Institut für Polymerforschung, Mainz, Germany.
authors.forename: Basit
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Yameen
authors.forename: Mubarak
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Ali
authors.forename: Reinhard
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Neumann
authors.forename: Wolfgang
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Ensinger
authors.forename: Wolfgang
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Knoll
authors.forename: Omar
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Azzaroni
mesh_terms: D004573:Electrolytes / Q000737:chemistry; D006863:Hydrogen-Ion Concentration; D007477:Ions / Q000737:chemistry; D007700:Kinetics; D049329:Nanostructures / Q000737:chemistry*; D036103:Nanotechnology / Q000379:methods*; D011108:Polymers / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D004573:Electrolytes; D007477:Ions; D011108:Polymers