Preparation of water-soluble amorphous erbium borate (ErBO3.3H2O) nanoparticles with positive charge

• Published in: Chemical papers Vol. 74; no. 3; pp. 1009 - 1017
• Main Authors: Bülbül, Berna, Beyaz, Seda, Akar, Mustafa
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cham Springer International Publishing 01.03.2020; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Biochemistry; Biomedical materials; Biotechnology; Chemical precipitation; Chemistry; Chemistry and Materials Science; Chemistry/Food Science; Crystal structure; Drug delivery systems; Erbium; Gravimetric analysis; Industrial Chemistry/Chemical Engineering; Infrared analysis; Infrared spectrophotometers; Materials Science; Medical imaging; Medicinal Chemistry; Nanoparticles; Organic chemistry; Original Paper; Paramagnetism; Photon correlation spectroscopy; Polyethylene glycol; Sodium hydroxide; Water chemistry; Zeta potential; Nanoparticle; Precipitation; Erbium borate
• ISSN: 2585-7290; 0366-6352; 1336-9075
• DOI: 10.1007/s11696-019-00940-5

We report a simple one-step protocol for the preparation of nearly monodisperse and highly water-soluble erbium borate nanoparticles through a co-precipitation method. Erbium ions were precipitated by boric acid/sodium hydroxide buffer with a pH of 9.2 in the presence of polyethylene glycol (2000 gmol −1 ) (PEG). As a result of the X-ray diffraction analysis, it was determined that the products that were precipitated in the medium with/without PEG were amorphous and the calcined product has an appropriate pattern for the vaterite-type ErBO 3 crystal structure. Infrared spectrophotometer and thermal gravimetric analysis revealed the chemical formulation of the ErBO 3 .3H 2 O compound. It was found that partially spherical nanoparticles have a size of 15 ± 6 nm according to TEM images. The average particle size was also measured in the water using dynamic light scattering method. The particles size is equal to about 100 nm in water and the zeta potential of particles is + 41 mV, which indicates a highly stable colloidal solution. Besides ErBO 3 .3H 2 O nanoparticles showed strong paramagnetism, their Bohr magnetron number was found as 9.48. Thus, these nanoparticles have promising properties for biomedical applications, such as cell targeting, drug delivery, and bioimaging.