Tailoring conducting polymer chemistry for deposition of nanostructured metals

PMSE 228

Hsing-Lin Wang, Wenguang Li, w.li@agiltron.com, Q. X. Jia, and Elshan A. Akhadov. Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM 87545
We report facile synthesis of Ag, Au, and Pt nanoparticles using conducting polymer (polyaniline, polypyrrole and polythiophene) colloids. Mixing conducting polymer colloids with metal ion solution results in formation of metal nanoparticles dispersed either within or outside conducting polymer colloids. The Ag nanoparticles have a fairly narrow size distribution from 2-4 nm and they remain stable in aqueous solution for more than a few weeks. Our synthesis is as simple as incrementally adding metal ion solution into aqueous conducting polymer colloids and does not require reducing agents such as NaBH4. This synthetic platform can be extended to grow metals on top of the PANI membrane surfaces. Immersing the PANI membranes into the metal ion solutions leads to formation of metals with various sizes, structures, and morphologies. Our study suggests that surface chemistry provides a mean for controlling the resultant metal structure and morphology using a simple electrodeless deposition method.