Journal of Physical Chemistry C
Journal of Physical Chemistry C
5 years ago

Unveiling the Inner Structure of PtPd Nanoparticles

Unveiling the Inner Structure of PtPd Nanoparticles
Daniel L. Baptista, Jonder Morais, Marcus V. Castegnaro, Vagner Z. C. Paes, Pedro L. Grande
Despite all efforts to explore the structural properties of bimetallic nanoparticles, there is still a constraint of proper tools to successfully probe their composition and atomic arrangement. In this work, bimetallic PtPd nanoparticles with approximately 5 nm mean diameter were synthesized to achieve distinct atomic distributions: nanoalloys or core@shell. The samples were probed by medium energy ion scattering (MEIS) and space-resolved elemental analysis via energy-dispersive X-ray (EDX) spectroscopy in scanning transmission electron microscope (STEM) mode. The complementary association of STEM-EDX profiling with MEIS, which simultaneously surveys millions of nanoparticles, becomes a powerful tool for a statistically representative structural analysis. As a result, the measurements provided key details such as core size, shell thickness, and composition and even distinguished core@shell from core@alloy structures. PtPd nanoalloys and Pd-core structures were successfully obtained, while the attempt to produce Pt-core NPs actually resulted in a mixture of nanoalloy and core@alloy structures (core = Pt or Pd). Moreover, MEIS sensitivity to the NPs’ shell enabled us to quantify its most plausible alloy composition.

Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acs.jpcc.7b05472

DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpcc.7b05472

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