Photochemical Synthesis of Electrically Conductive CdS Nanowires on DNA Scaffolds

Electrically conductive CdS nanowires are fabricated via a photochemical synthesis route using DNA as a scaffold. The nanowires are found to be several micrometers long and are either 40 – 50 nm in diameter or 70 – 80 in diameter when synthesized using solution-suspended or immobilized DNA, respectively. Various characterization methods showed that the wires consist of one continuous phase and exhibit Ohmic behavior similar to electrodes. The one-step process described herein does not perturb the conformation of the DNA chain and may be extended to the synthesis of other semiconducting composite nanoparticles.