Quantitative 3D determination of self-assembled structures on nanoparticles using small angle neutron scattering

• DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-03699-7
• Publication Date: 2018-04-04T02:55:41Z
• Authors: Zhi Luo; Domenico Marson; Quy K. Ong; Anna Loiudice; Joachim Kohlbrecher; Aurel Radulescu; Anwen Krause-Heuer; Tamim Darwish; Sandor Balog; Raffaella Buonsanti; Dmitri I. Svergun; Paola Posocco; Francesco Stellacci
• Keywords: Dispersity; Small-Angle Scattering

The ligand shell (LS) determines a number of nanoparticles' properties. Nanoparticles' cores can be accurately characterized; yet the structure LS, when composed mixture molecules, described only qualitatively (e.g., patchy, Janus, and random). Here we show that quantitative description LS' morphology monodisperse nanoparticles obtained using small-angle neutron scattering (SANS), measured at multiple contrasts, achieved by either or solvent deuteration. Three-dimensional models core LS are generated an ab initio reconstruction method. Characteristic length scales extracted from compared with simulations. We also characterize evolution upon thermal annealing, investigate mixed-ligand copper silver as well gold coated ternary mixtures. Our results suggest SANS combined multiphase modeling is versatile approach for characterization LS.