Bacteria photosensitized by intracellular gold nanoclusters for solar fuel production

Abstract

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Cucurbiturils brighten Au nanoclusters in water

“…In particular, thiolate-protected gold nanoclusters (AuNCs), 19 which have atomically precise compositions (Au x (SR) y , where x and y have exact values, SR ¼ thiolate ligands), have emerged as promising emissive and catalytic materials due to the intriguing optical and photoelectrical properties. [20][21][22][23][24][25][26] Different from common gold nanoparticles, AuNCs don't present a surface plasmon resonance (SPR) effect but show a unique Au(0) kernel-Au(I) shell structure with discrete energy levels, endowing AuNCs with full spectrum photoluminescence emission from blue to NIR as quantum dots and organic dyes. [27][28][29] Besides, the outstanding photo-stability, long carrier lifetime and Stokes shi, and efficient renal clearance properties make AuNCs ideal choices for analysis and bio-imaging.…”

Controllable Conversion of CO2on Non‐Metallic Gold Clusters

“…[16,17] They can also circumvent the sluggish kinetics of electron transfer for non-photosynthetic bacteria to enable photosynthesis of acetic acid from CO 2 . [18] Such studies are typically impossible for traditional metallic catalysts.…”

Anomalous phonon relaxation in Au 333 (SR) 79 nanoparticles with nascent plasmons

“…For example, SPR disappears when the size goes down below 2 nm due to quantum confinement effect and quantization of the conduction band (7). Unlike the conventional, plasmonic gold nanoparticles of facecentered cubic structure, the ultrasmall gold nanoparticles (socalled nanoclusters) with discrete energy levels exhibit unique geometrical (8)(9)(10) and electronic structures (11)(12)(13), and novel properties for applications in biomedicine (14,15), optoelectronics (16,17), and catalysis (18,19).…”