Molecular Imaging of Self-Assembled Rosette Nanotubes by Scanning Tunneling Microscopy

The self-assembled rosette nanotubes (RNT) are organic nanomaterials generated from the selfassembly of a bicyclic guanine-cytosine (GC motif) base. One of the advantages of these nanomaterials is the ability to tailor their function and properties by synthetically modifying the GC motif. Therefore, understanding the detailed supramolecular structure and arrangement of the RNTs with different functional groups is important. The physical characterization of RNTs using microscopy can be challenging because of their nanosclae dimensions (ca. 3-8 nm in diameter) and their sensitivity to physical and mechanical damage by standard microscopy techniques. Consequently, proper sample preparation and optimized imaging conditions are critical for successful characterization using microscopy techniques.