AFM-induced amine deprotection: triggering localized bond cleavage by application of tip/substrate voltage bias for the surface self-assembly of nanosized dendritic objects.

An alpha,alpha-dimethyl-3,5-dimethoxybenzyloxycarbonyl (DDZ)-protected amine monolayer can be selectively deprotected by the application of a voltage bias from a conducting AFM tip to afford localized nanoscale patterns that can be visualized by self-assembly of dendritic molecular objects with terminal carboxylic acid groups and different aspect ratios.