Overview of Synthetic Methods to Prepare Plasmonic Transition‐Metal Nitride Nanoparticles

Abstract

The search for new plasmonic materials that are low-cost, chemically and thermally stable, and exhibit low optical losses has garnered significant attentiona mong researchers. Recently,m etal nitrides have emerged as promising alternatives to conventional, noble-metal-based plasmonic materials, such as silver and gold. Many of the initial studies on metal nitridesh ave focused on computational prediction of the plasmonic properties of these materials. In recent years, several synthetic methods have been developed to enableempirical analysis. This review highlightssynthetic techniques for the preparation of plasmonic metal nitride nanoparticles, which are predominantly free-standing, by using solid-state and solid-gas phase reactions, nonthermal and arc plasma methods, and laser ablation. The physical properties of the nanoparticles, such as shape, size, crystallinity, and optical response, obtained with such synthetic methods are also summarized.

Precursor chemistry of metal nitride nanocrystals

“…40 The plasmonic response translates in a highly efficient conversion of sunlight into heat, an effect that has been used for water evaporation and desalination. [41][42][43][44] The position of the LSPR of TiN in the infrared region makes it suitable for photothermal therapies or plasmon-induced photocatalysis. 45 Given the optical properties of the group 4 metal nitrides, they are an attractive alternative for gold NCs.…”

Photocatalytic Plasmon‐Enhanced Nitrogen Reduction to Ammonia

“…[ 67 ] However, these metals are known to succumb to oxidation and therefore more chemically robust plasmonic materials such as Cr 2 N and HfN which have LSPR in the blue–UV region can also be used instead. [ 68 ] Although Au nanoparticles can expand the absorption into visible region, the near‐IR remains largely untapped. Sensitizing with plasmonic nanoparticles with LSPR in the near‐IR region such as Cu‐based materials and metal nitrides (TiN, ZrN), a larger portion of the solar spectrum can be harvested.…”

“…Sensitizing with plasmonic nanoparticles with LSPR in the near-IR region such as Cu-based materials and metal nitrides (TiN, ZrN), a larger portion of the solar spectrum can be harvested. [67,68] Plasmonic metal nitrides could also provide NVs for the N 2 molecule to adsorb and further enhance NRR activity.…”

Nanoplasmonics in High Pressure Environment

“…It would be interesting to apply this type of studies to other plasmonic materials that are well-known, such as silver, copper, palladium, and aluminum [39,40,43] in order to have the influence of the nature of the plasmonic material on the LSPR shift in high pressure environment. We can extend this investigation type to other alternative plasmonic materials, such as transition-metal nitride nanoparticles [44], transparent conductive oxides [46], and iron carbide nanoparticles encapsulated by graphene [99], which are materials at lower costs having a better temperature stability. Moreover, the domain of the nanoplasmonics in high pressure environment can be applied to sensing of analytes, pollutants in high pressure media as the marine medium, for instance.…”

“…In addition, nanoplasmonics can also enhance the sum-frequency generation signal [28][29][30][31][32] and the Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET) [33][34][35][36][37]. Gold and silver were largely used for the production of plasmonic nanostructures, and other alternative plasmonic materials were also employed, such as aluminum [38,39], copper [40,41], palladium [42,43], transition-metal nitrides [44,45], and transparent conductive oxides [46,47]. The plasmonic nanostructures allowed confining the electromagnetic (EM) field into subwavelength-size zones.…”