Effects of NH3 PECVD treatment time on the performance of multiwall carbon nanotubes for antibody immobilization

This work presents an amino plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposition (NH3 PECVD) treatment to modify multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) for the immobilization of antibodies (IgG-gold), and the effects of treatment time were studied. A titanium nitride (TiN) buffer layer and a nickel catalyst layer were deposited on silicon substrates for synthesis of MWCNTs using thermal CVD. The MWCNTs were modified by amine (NH2−) or amino (NH−) functional groups for 1, 3, and 5 min by PECVD, respectively. Mouse IgG-golds were immobilized on the modified MWCNTs using glutaraldehyde (GA) as a crosslinker. The performance of the modified MWCNTs was characterized by scanning electron microscope (SEM), energy dispersive spectrometer (EDS), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), contact angle system (CA), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS, ESCA), and UV–visible spectroscopy. Results show that the efficiency of IgG-gold immobilization was increased with the increase of NH3 PECVD treatment time. The NH3 PECVD treatment changed the surface properties of the MWCNTs, tuning them more hydrophilic without affecting their structure. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Biomed Mater Res Part B: Appl Biomater, 2015.