Conjugated Gold-Porphyrin Monolayers Assembled on Inorganic Surfaces

Gold nanoparticles show important properties owing to their electronic structures. A limitation of some gold nanoparticles is that they either show surface plasmons or luminescence. The increase in size of the gold nanoparticles, and the appearance of the surface plasmons may result in the disappearance of luminescence. The aim of our study is the nanoscale assembly of Au nanoparticles on a monolayer of porphyrin molecules anchored to functionalized inorganic surfaces. This functional architecture not only exhibits a strong surface plasmon due to the gold nanoparticles, but also a strong luminescence signal from the porphyrin molecules. Finally we observed a long-range order in the Au nanoparticles conjugated to the porphyrin monolayer.