Structuring of silica nanoparticle suspension by neutron reflectivity
11 March 2020 Credit: BNC / L. Bottyán | Self-organization of the silica nanoparticle suspension normal to the silica–water interface | ||||
The behavior of colloidal particles at a water-solid interface is relevant in material science, food processing, medicine and environmental enginee-ring. A team from the University of Geneva with researchers from the Budapest Neutron Centre used neutron reflectivity to study colloidal silica nanoparticle suspensions near the like-charged native-oxide-covered surface of Si. Intriguingly, the nanospheres develop a self-organized damped, oscillatory concentration profile normal to the interface, as demonstrated in the figure. | ![]() |
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P. Maroni, M. Gvaramia, D. Kosior, K. Kubiak, L. Scarratt, A. M. Smith, D. G. Merkel, L. Bottyán, M. Borkovec, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys. 2020, 22, 6449 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1039/d0cp00465k |
Neutron reflectivity of an aquous suspension of silica nano-spheres of volume fraction 0.10 along with the extracted scattering length density (SLD) profile as inset | Schematic representation (a) and calculated volume fraction profile (b) of the water - silica nanosphere suspension near the interface |