A new strategy for the controlled deposition of gold nanoparticle aggregates on two-dimensional polystyrene arrays and its application in glucose oxidase immobilization

Nano/microstructures play an important role in nanoparticle applications. This paper describes an innovative strategy to fabricate a variety of gold nanoparticle aggregates (AuNPs) on large-scale arrays of up to ∼1 cm2 made from polystyrene (PS). A dendritic surfactant, C18N3, has multi-amine head groups that can control the thickness of a double layer adsorbed on the PS sphere surface in a pH-dependent manner. Controlling the pH and immersion time in the C18N3 solution allows the morphology of AuNPs deposited on the PS spheres (PS@AuNP) to be regulated. The influence of nano/microstructures on the activity enhancement of glucose oxidase (GOD) was investigated. The results indicated that well-ordered PS@AuNP arrays performed much better in the specific activity enhancement of GOD compared with free GOD and GOD immobilized on PS arrays. Furthermore, it was observed that the immobilized GOD on 2D PS@AuNP arrays maintained a highly improved operational stability compared to free GOD. The mechanism behind this effect is discussed. For practical applications, prepared PS@AuNP arrays can be used as an effective chip for GOD immobilization and application.

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► The ordered gold-decorated polystyrene (PS@AuNP) film is successfully fabricated.
► The well-defined structure is based on the novel dentritic surfactant as “glue.”
► Glucose oxidase (GOD) is immobilized on the ordered and the disordered PS@AuNP arrays.
► Increasing activity and stability of GOD are obtained after immobilization.
► The ordered PS@AuNP film performs best.