Dendronization-induced phase-transfer, stabilization and self-assembly of large colloidal Au nanoparticlesElectronic supplementary information (ESI) available: TEM microscope images. See DOI: 10.1039/c6nr03404g

• Main Authors: Malassis, Ludivine, Jishkariani, Davit, Murray, Christopher B, Donnio, Bertrand
• Format: Journal Article
• Published: 07.07.2016
• ISSN: 2040-3364; 2040-3372
• DOI: 10.1039/c6nr03404g

The phase-transfer of CTAB-coated aqueous, spherical gold nanoparticles, with metallic core diameters ranging from ca . 27 to 54 nm, into organic solvents by exchanging the primitive polar bilayer with lipophilic, disulfide dendritic ligands is reported. The presence of such a thick nonpolar organic shell around these large nanoparticles enhances their stabilization against aggregation, in addition to enabling their transfer into a variety of solvents such as chloroform, toluene or tetrahydrofuran. Upon the slow evaporation of a chloroform suspension deposited on a solid support, the dendronized hybrids were found to self-assemble into ring structures of various diameters. Moreover, their self-assembly at the liquid-air interface affords the formation of fairly long-range ordered monolayers, over large areas, that can then be entirely transferred onto solid substrates. We demonstrate that large CTAB-coated gold nanoparticles can be transferred into organic solvents and self-assembled with different organizations by exchanging the CTAB with lipophilic, disulfide dendritic ligands.