Carbon nanotubes on HPLC silica microspheres

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) constitute a new class of materials with potential applications ranging from nanoelectronics to medicinal chemistry. The well defined inner and outer surfaces of carbon nanotubes act as efficient sensors for studying their recognition properties towards a variety of molecular targets, including small organic ligands and biologically relevant molecules. A major problem encountered in detecting and analyzing molecular interactions is related to the difficult manipulation of individual nanotubes, usually present in bundles and ropes and especially insoluble in both organic and water-rich media. A possible way to overcome this limitation consists in the deposition of CNTs on a chromatographic solid matrix (e.g. HPLC silica microparticles) to generate a packing material on which the relative affinities of potential ligands can be studied by monitoring their retention under controlled experimental conditions. Here we describe the preparation and characterization of hybrid materials composed by CNTs deposited on the external surface of porous silica microspheres, their characterization and use in high performance liquid chromatography experiments.