A schematic, image, and graph. The schematic shows an octahedron with two gold nanoparticles attached on the top and bottom, with a quantum dot loaded in the center. The image is a single-molecule fluorescence image showing the organization of the octahedrons. The graph displays quantum dot emission under different polarization angles.

​Self-Assembled Optical ​Self-Assembled Optical Nanomaterial

Architectured nanoparticle systems with light emitting and light absorbing nanoscale components, such as plasmonic nanoparticles and quantum dots, offer novel optical properties due to the collective effects. However, in order to realize tunable optical responses from such hetero-nanoparticle systems, well-defined nano-architectures with targeted nanoparticle arrangements have to be fabricated.

Our efforts address this challenge by establishing methods for digital bottom-up assembly using programmable processes. We use nucleic acids as nanomaterials that can be addressed and prescribed in order to build complex multiscale organizations from inorganic and bio-organic nano-components. We employ programmable molecular interfacing, soft matter effects and inverse design principles for controlling desired equilibrium and out-equilibrium systems' states. The effort aims to establish practical and broadly applicable by-design material fabrication platforms based on digitizing self-organization processes.