Monitoring the ordering in biomolecular films on vicinal silicon surfaces by reflectance difference/anisotropy spectroscopy

DNA base molecules, adenine, thymine, guanine, and cytosine may be employed as charge transport molecules in biomolecular electronic devices. Their electronic properties are comparable with those of inorganic wide bandgap materials, e.g. GaN with the absorption onset in the near ultra-violet (UV) range. A recent field effect transistor study based on a modified DNA base revealed that the prototype bio-transistor gives rise to a better voltage gain compared to one based on carbon nanotubes (CNTs) [G. Mauricio, P. Visconti, V. Arima, S. D'Amico, A. Biasco, E. D'Amone, R. Cingolani, R. Rinaldi, Nanoletters 3 (2003) 479]. Here, in situ reflectance difference/anisotropy spectroscopy (RDS/RAS) is employed under ultra-high vacuum (UHV) conditions for monitoring the growth of DNA base molecules on vicinal hydrogen passivated Si(1 1 1) surfaces. Such vicinal substrates consisting of steps and terraces may serves as suitable templates for molecular ordering. Indeed, RDS/RAS measurements reveal information about molecular ordering of DNA bases induced by the density of steps on silicon surfaces. All four molecules, however, behave differently on the vicinal substrates. The first transition dipole moments corresponding to adenine and thymine molecules align mainly perpendicular to the step edge direction while for guanine and cytosine they align parallel to this direction, however, only in very thin layers. The RDS/RAS signal of the guanine and cytosine layers with thicknesses above 20 nm saturates due to a loss of ordering at higher coverages. Additionally, time-resolved RDS/RAS measurements at the silicon E2 (4.25 eV) critical point (CP) demonstrate the sensitivity to the biomolecular/inorganic interface formation.