Characterization of the nucleation process of Ag nanocrystals containing Polyvinylpyrrolidone and Ethylene glycol

MELISA GIANETTI; CRISTIAN BALBUENA; EZEQUIEL R. SOULÉ

Simposio; SIMPOSIO LATIONAMERICANO DE POLIMEROS; 2018

Metal nanocrystals have gained tremendous attention due to their superior performance in several applications: selective catalysis, electronic devices, high-precision spectroscopy and imaging, etc. The versatility of functional nanocrystals predominantly relies on their tuneable size and shape. The ability to synthesize nanocrystals with controlled shapes has emerged in the last decade. A solid fundamental understanding of the nano-scale physical and chemical process involved in the synthesis process, which in many aspects is still in an elementary stage, is required for rational design and control of size and shape of these nanocrystals.Understanding the nucleation and growth of metal nanocrystals is a significant challenge in the development of these functional nanomaterials. In this work, we studied PolyVinylPyrrolidone (PVP)-mediated synthesis of Ag nanocrystals in Ethylene Glycol (EG) solvent through fully atomistic Molecular Dynamic simulations. We focus our study on characterizing the nucleation process.