Metal nanoparticles (NPs) are of great interest for applications in catalysis, electronics, and chemical sensing. Their utility is dictated by compositional and physical parameters such as particle size, particle shape, composition, and overall architecture (e.g., hollow vs. solid). Interestingly, the addition of a second metal to create bimetallic NPs adds promising multifunctionality, with new emergent properties. However, reliably synthesizing bimetallic NPs remains a great challenge. One synthetic pathway to architecturally controlled bimetallic NPs is seed mediated co-reduction (SMCR) in which two metal precursors are simultaneously co-reduced to deposit metal onto shape-controlled metal seeds. Previously demonstrated using a Au-Pd system, here SMCR is applied to a system with a larger lattice mismatch between the depositing metals: Pd and Cu (7% mismatch for Pd-Cu vs. 4% for Au-Pd). Through manipulation of precursor reduction kinetics, the morphology and bimetallic distribution were tuned to achieve 8-branched Pd-Cu NPs with Cu localized at the tips and Pd-Cu alloy nanostructures. Significantly, the symmetry of the seeds can be transferred to the final nanostructures. By expanding the compositional range for bimetallic deposition, the synthesis of new structurally defined nanostructures should be possible and allow for the composition-dependent properties of these materials to be studied and applied.

Synthesis of branched and polyhedral Pd-Cu nanostructures by seed-mediated co-reduction

253rd National Meeting (2017)

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