Study of fibrinogen adsorption on self-assembled monolayers on Au(1 1 1) by atomic force microscopy

The adsorption of plasma protein fibrinogen on the self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) of n-hexadecyl mercaptan and citrate was investigated with atomic force microscopy (AFM). On the basis of the preparation of these two flat SAMs on Au(1 1 1), high-resolution AFM images of bovine fibrinogen were obtained with different protein concentrations. The results indicated that the surface chemical composition significantly affected the adsorption behavior of fibrinogen. Since fibrinogen plays a key role in the regulation of both haemostasis and thrombosis, high-resolution AFM imaging on SAMs is expected to be an effective approach to study the haemocompatibility of materials with different surface chemistry.