Morphologically controlled Au nanosheets assisted by ferulic acid

Gold nanoparticles (Au NPs) and nanosheets (Au NSs) are promising materials for their optical and electronic applications. However, to synthesize Au NPs a seeded growth process or morphology transformation is often required. In this study, we present that morphologically controlled Au NSs could be synthesized by using the antioxidant, ferulic acid (FA). The synthesized Au NPs and NSs according to some factors such as reaction temperature, concentrations of FA and metal precursor, affecting the size and shape of Au NPs and NSs, were characterized by UV-Vis-NIR, TEM, AFM, and XRD studies. The results showed that FA acted as a reducing agent and as a capping agent in the synthesis of Au NPs and Au NSs. The UV-Vis-NIR spectral studies proved the presence of a surface Plasmon resonance band corresponding to the spherical and anisotropic structures in the visible and near infrared (NIR) regions. AFM study showed that the thickness of the synthesized NSs was about 15 to 20 nm, and XRD analysis indicated the presence of pure crystalline Au NPs corresponding to Bragg reflection of face centered cubic (fcc) lattice. The present study provides a new way to synthesize shape-controllable anisotropic Au NSs by using a green chemical technique.