Stacking Nanoparticles with Jewel-like Results

August 06, 2008

It's happens all of the time in the produce section of your local grocer. Someone stacks the oranges or the apples in a carefully arranged pile to keep the round fruit from rolling all over the place.

Now researchers have found a way to do that quickly with nanoparticles. The result is an aggregate of these particles (right) that looks very similar to an opalescent gem.

Using different sized particles (the apples and oranges -- think Granny Smith vs. Clementines) produces different effects. That's because different sized particles reflect light through the holes between the stacked nanoparticles in various way. Manipulating the effect nanoparticles have on light in a controlled way could lead to better and cheaper light-emitting diodes, optical fibers for communications, submicroscopic lasers, ultrawhite pigments, antennas and reflectors and optical integrated circuits.

The researchers, professor Orlin Velev and graduate student researcher Vinayak Rastogi at North Carolina State University, made the jewel-like formation by allowing nanoparticles mixed into a solution to dry on a surface that repels water like the plague, a characteristic known as superhydrophobicity.

The team reported their work in the July 28 issue of Advanced Materials.

Photo: Vinayak Rastogi/North Carolina State University

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nice article