Solution grown colloidal semiconductor nanocrystals are stabilized by ligands that influence their stability, electronic, and optical properties. In contrast to unary and binary semiconductors, the surface chemistry and ligand exchange on various functional group in complex ternary and quaternary materials is little explored. Here, we synthesized biocompatible rock salt ternary NaBiS2 nanocrystals through soft chemistry techniques that display size tunability (2-28 nm). We report a facile biphasic ligand exchange procedure that utilizes monodentate (iodine) and multidentate (thiol) ligands. This procedure efficiently displaces native carboxylate, amine, and thioamides that chelate to the surface of NaBiS2 producing polar, water-soluble nanocrystals. We demonstrate that these thiol capped ligands can be functionalized with long, biocompatible polymers that further improve nanocrystal stability. Ligand exchange and nanocrystal stability were investigated by IR, MS, UV-Vis, TGA/DSC, and XRD. We anticipate that these finding will shed light on ligand exchange in other ternary and quaternary materials.

Ligand exchange on ternary sodium bismuth dichalcogenide using multidentate ligands

2019 Spring National Meeting

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