From Atoms to Lives: The Evolution of Nanoparticle Assemblies

Abstract

Nanoparticle (NP) assemblies have been studied over the past several decades, and the field is advancing more quickly and reaching into more diverse fields. Reports issued from academic and industrial laboratories have driven these advances. Countless breakthroughs have been reported in widely different fields, including thermoelectronics, photoelectronics, catalysts, energy sources, and medical carriers. A “family tree” is clearly needed to accurately trace the developments in the study of NP assemblies. This review uses the unconventional approach of comparing the atomic and NP worlds to describe the development of NP research during the past several decades. The corresponding classifications, such as atoms and NPs, molecules and molecular‐type NP assemblies, crystals and crystalline‐type NP assemblies, biological organisms and analogous artificial assemblies, and biologically functional NP complex assemblies, are discussed in detail. It concludes with remarks concerning the trend from nonliving to living applications of NP assemblies.

Gold nanoparticles grafted with chemically incompatible ligands

“…Thin lms made of nanoparticles (NPs) with a metallic core and organic shell are highly attractive materials with unusual optoelectronic and physicochemical properties 'encoded' in the inorganic and organic parts of the NPs. [1][2][3][4][5] Due to their wide application potential, [6][7][8] new, simple methods of assembling and controlling the structure of solid-state nanocomposites are intensively studied. 9,10 Controlling the shape of the inorganic parts is a critical factor on the way to accessing a wide variety of symmetries of structures made of NPs.…”

Effect of structure: A new insight into nanoparticle assemblies from inanimate to animate

“…There are two main reasons for this: First, the application performance of NPs is always based on collective rather than individual NP performance, so interparticle interactions and structure-property relationships must be studied systematically. The second reason is the very high surface energy of NPs, in turn due to the high specific surface area; this provides a tremendous driving force to decrease the Gibbs free energy (12). Energy-driven spontaneous organization of NPs must eventually lead to a large and stable assembly.…”

A mechanically robust copper mesh with switchable wettability and antibacterial activity for selective oil–water separation

“…[12][13][14] Since Jiang et al [15] first prepared materials with superhydrophobic properties, the preparation strategy of superhydrophobic materials has been continually proposed. [16][17][18][19][20][21][22] Generally, we divide the separation materials into two categories according to the separation environment: superhydrophobic/superolephilic materials and superoleophobic/superhydrophilic materials. [23][24][25][26][27][28][29] Because it is difficult to prepare superoleophobic and superhydrophilic materials in air, most of the reports focus on the preparation of superhydrophobic materials.…”