Uniform Decoration of Reduced Graphene Oxide Sheets with Gold Nanoparticles

Huanping Yang,Weiwei Zhou,Ting Yu,Yingying Wang,Bo Yu,Chunxiao Cong

doi:10.1155/2012/328565

Abstract

A simple method employing ionic liquid functionalization is developed to achieve the uniform decoration of reduced graphene oxide sheets with gold nanoparticles. The synthesis of ionic liquid modified graphene oxide is accomplished by covalently binding 1-(3-Aminopropyl) imidazole with GO sheets. The formation mechanism of Au nanoparticles on RGO sheets is proposed to loadAuCl4-onto the surface of GO sheets through anion exchange; then reduceAuCl4-to Au NPs and at the same time reduce GO sheets to RGO sheets via a one-step process. The presence of Au NPs is well identified by SEM, TEM, and XPS. As a concept, the RGO-supported Au NPs is applied to surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy.

Highlights

Graphene is a single layer of carbon atoms that are densely packed into hexagonal structure
After realizing the functionalization of Graphene Oxide (GO) with ionic liquid 1-(3-Aminopropyl) imidazole, uniform distribution of gold NPs are readily accomplished on the surface of RGO sheets by reducing GO and the AuCl4− anions pre attached on GO via anion exchange
On the basis of our experimental procedure, the mechanism to interpret the formation of the as-obtained RGO-Au nanocomposites is put forward, as shown in Scheme 1

Summary

Introduction

Graphene is a single layer of carbon atoms that are densely packed into hexagonal structure It exhibits extraordinary electronic, thermal, and mechanical properties, which make it to be a promising candidate for a variety of applications [1]. Fu et al reported that by using in situ synthesis method they synthesized the graphene-metal nanoparticle based derivatives, which give the surface-enhanced Raman scattering properties (SERS) [12]. After realizing the functionalization of GO with ionic liquid 1-(3-Aminopropyl) imidazole, uniform distribution of gold NPs are readily accomplished on the surface of RGO sheets by reducing GO and the AuCl4− anions pre attached on GO via anion exchange. We get the water soluble RGO-Au nanocomposite, which can be used as a good SERS substrate. Scheme 1: The formation mechanism for RGO-Au nanocomposites. Au nanoparticles

Experiment

Results and Discussions

65 C–N stretching

Conclusions