Preparation and characterization of noble metal nanoparticles using dendrimers as protective colloids

摘要

Noble metal nanoparticles such as gold, platinum, and silver have been prepared by reduction of their metal salts in the presence of poly(amidoamine) dendrimers with various surface functional groups. In aqueous solutions of dendrimers with surface amino groups, stable nanoparticles of gold and platinum are obtained by adsorbing the surface amino groups of the dendrimers in which the particle size of the gold nanoparticles is considerably affected by the generation of the dendrimer as well as the den-drimer concentration. On the other hand, in nonaqueous solutions of dendrimers with surface methyl ester groups and hydrocarbon chains dendrimer-encapsulated noble metal nanoparticles are obtained. Thus, the size of the noble metal nanoparticles and the morphology of noble metal-dendri-mer composites can be controlled in aqueous or nonaqueous solutions by using dendrimers with various surface groups.