The talk will describe the fabrication of micro and nano patterned surfaces on III-V semiconductor materials. The development of surface chemistry strategies to immobilize unique peptides to inorganic surfaces will be presented. The approaches used include unconventional lithographic methodologies to precisely place the peptides on various substrates and a host of surface spectroscopic techniques to understand the chemical composition, molecular conformation and mechanical properties of the molecules on the patterned surface. The fundamental knowledge gained is being utilized to fabricate much improved microfabricated sensors for diagnostic purposes and advanced platforms for tissue engineering applications.