This work examines the anisotropic electroless plating of DNA-functionalized gold nanorods attached to a DNA origami template to fabricate continuous metal structures of rectanglar, square, and T shapes. DNA origami, a versatile method for assembling a variety of 2- and 3-D nanostructures, is utilized to construct the DNA breadboard template used for this study. Staple strands on selective sites of the breadboard template are extended with an additional nucleotide sequence for the attachment of DNA-functionalized gold nanorods to the template via base pairing. The nanorod-seeded DNA templates are then introduced into an electroless gold plating solution to determine the extent to which the anisotropic growth of the nanorods is able to fill the gaps between seeds to create continuous structures. Our results show that the DNA-functionalized nanorods grow anisotropically during plating at a rate that is approximately 4 times faster in the length direction than in the width direction to effectively fill gaps of up to 11–13 nm in length. The feasibility of using this directional growth at specific sites to enable the fabrication of continuous metal nanostructures with diameters as thin as 10 nm is demonstrated and represents important progress toward the creation of devices and systems based on self-assembled biological templates.

中文翻译：

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DNA功能化纳米棒的定向生长，以实现DNA折纸模板的连续，特定于位点的金属化

这项工作检查了附着在DNA折纸模板上的DNA功能化金纳米棒的各向异性化学镀，以制造矩形，方形和T形的连续金属结构。DNA折纸是一种用于组装各种2-D和3-D纳米结构的通用方法，可用于构建用于本研究的DNA面包板模板。面包板模板选择性位点上的主链以额外的核苷酸序列延伸，用于通过碱基配对将DNA功能化的金纳米棒附着到模板上。然后将播种有纳米棒的DNA模板引入化学镀金溶液中，以确定纳米棒的各向异性生长能够填充种子之间的间隙以创建连续结构的程度。我们的结果表明，DNA功能化的纳米棒在电镀过程中各向异性生长，其长度方向的长度比宽度方向的速度快约4倍，从而有效地填充了长达11-13 nm的间隙。证明了在特定位置使用这种定向生长以制造直径薄至10 nm的连续金属纳米结构的可行性，并代表了在基于自组装生物模板的设备和系统的创建方面的重要进展。