E-FIELD RESPONSIVE FUNCTIONAL SELF-ASSEMBLED MONOLAYERS

  We have developed a novel stimuli responsive self-assembled monolayer, which could catch and release the surface-bound guest molecules in response to applied electrical potential.  During the course of the research, we have also found that a salt-bridge interaction between the guest and the monolayer is enhanced when approaching a hydrophobic surface in subnanoscale.

  On a protein surface, ion-pairs often exist near hydrophobic surfaces.  In the 1950s, these ion-pairs are predicted to be strongly bound together more than that in solution.  Our experimental observation of hydrophobic modulation of salt-bridge became the first experimental proof for this long-standing theory.