title: Self-assembly of gold nanorods coated with phospholipids: a coarse-grained molecular dynamics study.
abstract: The self-assembly of phospholipid-coated gold nanorods (GNRs) was investigated by coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations. We predict that in addition to the formation of deformed vesicles encapsulating GNRs with diverse orientations, the lipid-coated GNRs can form a semi-ring attached to an excess vesicle phase, a branch with excess vesicle phase, a ring phase, a branch phase, a stack phase, and a vortex phase. The morphologies of the lipid-GNR complexes depend on the lipid/GNR molar ratio and the interaction strength between the nanorod surface and the lipid head groups. At given lipid-nanorod interactions, removing the lipid induces a phase transition from an isolated ring or branch phase to an aggregated vortex or stack phase and vice versa. As the lipid-coated GNRs transit from an isolated phase to an aggregated phase, the structure of the lipid at the nanorod surface converts from a bilayer state to a non-bilayer state.
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Theoretical and Computational Photochemistry, Ministry of Education, College of Chemistry, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Mingwei
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Wan
authors.forename: Xiaoxu
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Lianghui
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Gao
authors.forename: Weihai
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Fang
mesh_terms: D006046:Gold; D008051:Lipid Bilayers; D056004:Molecular Dynamics Simulation; D043942:Nanotubes; D044367:Phase Transition; D010743:Phospholipids
chemical_list: D008051:Lipid Bilayers; D010743:Phospholipids; D006046:Gold