Issue 4, 2019

Preparation of high-yield and ultra-pure Au25 nanoclusters: towards their implementation in real-world applications

Abstract

Colloidal approaches allow for the synthesis of Au nanoclusters (NCs) with atomic precision and sizes ranging from a few to hundreds of atoms. In most of the cases, these processes involve a common strategy of thiol etching of initially polydisperse Au nanoparticles into atomically precise NCs, resulting in the release of Au-thiolate complexes as byproducts. To the best of our knowledge, neither the removal of these byproducts nor the mass spectra in the relevant mass region were shown in previous studies. A thorough analysis of inorganic byproducts in the synthesis of [Au25(PPh3)10(PET)5X2]2+ NC, abbreviated as Au25 NC, reveals that published protocols lead to Au25 NCs in vanishingly small quantities compared to their byproducts. Three purification methods are presented to separate byproducts from the desired Au25 NCs which are proposed to be applicable to other promising Au NC systems. Additionally, critical factors for a successful synthesis of Au25 NCs are identified and discussed including the role of residual water. An important finding is that the etching duration is very critical and must be monitored by UV-Vis spectroscopy resulting in synthetic yields as high as 40%.

Graphical abstract: Preparation of high-yield and ultra-pure Au25 nanoclusters: towards their implementation in real-world applications

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
10 Oct 2018
Accepted
02 Jan 2019
First published
03 Jan 2019
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY-NC license

Nanoscale, 2019,11, 1988-1994

Preparation of high-yield and ultra-pure Au25 nanoclusters: towards their implementation in real-world applications

M. Galchenko, R. Schuster, A. Black, M. Riedner and C. Klinke, Nanoscale, 2019, 11, 1988 DOI: 10.1039/C8NR08200F

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