In this report, crystalline elemental Cu and Ni nanowires have been successfully synthesized through a simplistic, malleable, solution-based protocol involving the utilization of a U-tube double diffusion apparatus under ambient conditions. The nanowires prepared within the 50 and 200 nm template membrane pore channels maintain diameters ranging from ~90-230 nm with lengths attaining the micrometer scale. To mitigate for the unwanted but very facile oxidation of these nanomaterials to their oxide analogues, our synthesis mechanism relies on a carefully calibrated reaction between the corresponding metal precursor solution and an aqueous reducing agent solution, resulting in the production of pure, monodisperse metallic nanostructures. These as-prepared nanowires were subsequently characterized from an applications' perspective so as to investigate their optical and photocatalytic properties.

Synthesis of coinage metal nanowires under ambient, seedless, surfactantless conditions

247th National Meeting (2014)

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.