In this paper, we report a simple yet powerful synthetic method for obtaining monodispersed silver nanoparticles by direct thermal decomposition of two materials — one is silver acetate as a source of the metal core and the other is myristic acid as a capping agent. The reaction was performed at 250°C, the boiling point of myristic acid, without additional solvent. The nucleation and growth of the particles were monitored by dynamic light scattering in order to optimize the reaction time. By this simple procedure, we could obtain uniformly sized Ag nanoparticles with the average diameter of 4.8 ± 0.1 nm. Although the particles were synthesized at high temperature, the ligand exchange between myristates and alkanethiolates can be achieved at room temperature. Significant characteristics of Ag nanoparticles attributed to localized surface plasmons were investigated.

Crosslinkable banana‐shaped ferroelectric liquid crystals (LCs) are expected to show excellent thermal and mechanical stability upon polymerization as well as long‐term stability. A new bis‐dipolar crosslinkable monomer/conventional banana LC mixture is explored by these authors and the molecular alignment changes before and after polymerization are examined. A polymerization‐induced phase structure is observed (see Figure).

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract