Gold nanoclusters (Au NCs) are atomically precise ultrasmall particles with tunable components, tailorable functionality, and well-defined hierarchical tertiary structure analogous to the natural enzymes, which show great potentials in selective catalysis to substitute natural enzymes. However, few studies focus on the enzyme-like activities of Au NCs, especially the ligand effect in controlling the catalytic performance in the field of enzymatic catalysis. Herein, we selected the atomically precise Au15 NCs as model catalysts to verify the crucial roles of the ligands in elaborately tuning the catalytic activity and stability of Au NCs. A series of Au15 NCs with different protective ligands were designed via the typical CO-reduction method. The as-synthesized Au15 NCs exhibit totally different structural stability against the external environments (i.e. pH conditions, temperatures). More importantly, their catalytic activity can be finely controlled by simply changing the protective ligands. Overall, the catalytic activity and stability of Au15(NAC)13 are superior to that of Au15(MMPA)13. Furthermore, DFT calculations were carried out to reveal the catalytic mechanisms. Our study proves the feasibility of Au NCs in mimicking the natural enzymes, which may provide insights in artificial enzyme design and the applications of metal nanoclusters

Engineering atomically precise gold nanoclusters with controllable catalytic activity and robust stability for peroxidase mimics

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ACS Fall 2022

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