Polymer brushes via surface-initiated electrochemically mediated ATRP: Role of a sacrificial initiator in polymerization of acrylates on silicon substrates

Abstract

Silicon wafers as semiconductors are essential components of integrated circuits in electronic devices. For this reason, modification of the silicon surface is an important factor in themanufacturing of new hybridmaterials applied inmicro-and nanoelectronics. Herein, copolymer brushes of hydrophilic poly(2-hydroxyethyl acrylate) (PHEA) and hydrophobic poly(tert-butyl acrylate) (PtBA) were grafted from silicon wafers via simplified electrochemically mediated atom transfer radical polymerization (seATRP) according to a surface-initiated approach. The syntheses of PHEA-b-PtBA copolymers were carried out with diminished catalytic complex concentration (successively 25 and 6 ppm of Cu). In order to optimize the reaction condition, the effect of the addition of a supporting electrolyte was investigated. Acontrolled increase in PHEAbrush thicknesswas confirmed by atomic forcemicroscopy (AFM). Various other parameters including contact angles and free surface energy (FSE) for themodified silicon wafer were presented. Furthermore, the effect of the presence of a sacrificial initiator in solution on the thickness of the grafted brushes was reported. Successfully fabricated inorganic-organic hybrid nanomaterials show potential application in biomedicine and microelectronics devices, e.g., biosensors.