Lipase catalyzed esterification of therapeutic drugs to functional self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) on 316L stainless steel (SS) after assembly has been demonstrated. SAMs of 16-mercaptohexadecanoic acid (-COOH SAM) and 11-mercapto-1-undecanol (-OH SAM) were formed on 316L SS, and lipase catalysis was used to attach therapeutic drugs, perphenazine and ibuprofen, respectively, on these SAMs. The reaction was carried out in toluene at 60 degrees C for 5 h using Novozyme-435 as the biocatalyst. The FTIR spectra after surface modification of -OH SAMs showed the presence of the C=O stretching bands at 1745 cm(-1), which was absent in the FTIR spectra of -OH SAMs. Similarly, the FTIR spectra after the reaction of the -COOH SAM with perphenazine showed two peaks in the carbonyl region, a peak at 1764 cm(-1), which is the representative peak for the C=O stretching for esters. The second peak at 1681 cm(-1) is assigned to the C=O stretching of the remaining unreacted terminal COOK XPS spectra after lipase catalysis with ibuprofen showed a photoelectron peak evolving at 288.5 eV which arises from the carbon (C=O) of the carboxylic acid of the drug (ibuprofen). Similarly for -COOH SAMs, after esterifiation we see a small, photoelectron peak evolving at 286.5 eV which corresponds to the C in the methylene groups adjacent to the oxygen (C-O), which should evolve only after the esterification of perphenazine with the -COOH SAM. Thus, lipase catalysis provides an alternate synthetic methodology for surface modification of functional SAMs after assembly.