Search

Due to its simplicity, flexibility and conformity, electroless plating presents itself as an attractive route towards functional metal nanostructures. Despite the importance for creating multimetallic materials with enhanced properties, the complex interactions between the components in electroless plating baths make alloy formations a challenging objective. In this work, we outline an electroless plating strategy fabricating Pd−Pt alloy nanomaterials, which is based on arbitrarily miscible plating baths for the individual metals. To demonstrate the excellent nanoscale conformity and homogeneity of our plating system, we apply it to ion track‐etched polymer templates with large inner surfaces as ambitious substrates, resulting in the formation of 3D free‐standing PdₓPt₁₀₀₋ₓ‐nanotube‐networks (NTNWs). Based on the electro‐oxidation of methanol as a model reaction, we utilize the compositional freedom provided by our syntheses for optimizing the catalytic performance of our metal NTNWs, which heavily depends on the Pd−Pt ratio. Within our system, the highest surface normalized activity was found for the Pd₂₀Pt₈₀ NTNW, reaching more than a two‐fold increase of the peak current density in comparison to pure Pt. Overall, our reaction system provides a versatile toolkit for fabricating intricate Pd−Pt nanostructures of arbitrary elemental composition, and constitutes a starting point for designing new electroless alloy plating baths.

We replicate the unique pore structure of ion-track etched polymers with carbon using an organic sol-gel precursor strategy. First, phenol resin is cross-linked in the membrane pores, followed by selective dissolution of the template matrix and carbonization at a temperature of 550 degrees C. The potential to create nanomaterials of novel morphology is demonstrated by synthesizing free-standing, interconnected networks composed of aligned carbon nanowires of defined or modulated diameter.

International audience; Calcination of cyclopentadienyltitanium-based organic-inorganic hybrid materials at 450-500 °C led to the formation of anatase titanium dioxide as white powders consisting of a porous network of aggregated nanoparticles, the nanoporosity detected being related to the inter-particle space. Depending on the calcination temperatures, the surface area of the titanium dioxide particles varied from 65 to 158 m(2) g(-1).