| Abstract
| - Biosilicification in diatoms is achieved by specific interactions between silaffins, composed of polypeptidesand long-chain polyamines, and silicic acid derivatives. The polycondensation of silicic acids is reportedto be catalyzed by the long-chain polyamines that mainly contain tertiary N-methylpropyleneimine moieties.In this report, we utilized a tertiary amine-containing polymer, poly(2-(dimethylamino)ethyl methacrylate)(poly(DMAEMA)), as a surface-grafted, biomimetic counterpart of the long-chain polyamines in silaffinsand demonstrated that the surface-initiated polycondensation of silicic acids, leading to the formation ofsilica thin films, proceeded smoothly on surfaces presenting poly(DMAEMA), where poly(DMAEMA) wasgrown from gold surfaces by surface-initiated, atom transfer radical polymerization. The formed silica filmwas characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, atomicforce microscopy, and scanning electron microscopy.
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