Search results for "nanoparticle"

Diffusion and outgassing of O<inf>2</inf> in amorphous SiO<inf>2</inf> silica nanoparticles with specific surface properties

2014

Vibrational properties of the surface-nonbridging oxygen in silica nanoparticles

2008

By studying the site-selective luminescence spectra of oxidized silica nanoparticles we identify the electronic and the vibrational lines associated with the surface nonbridging oxygen, $\ensuremath{\equiv}{\text{Si-O}}^{\ifmmode\bullet\else\textbullet\fi{}}$. This defect emits a zero-phonon line inhomogeneously distributed around 2.0 eV with full width at half maximum of 0.04 eV, weakly coupled with the local ${\text{Si-O}}^{\ifmmode\bullet\else\textbullet\fi{}}$ stretching mode whose frequency is measured to be $920\text{ }{\text{cm}}^{\ensuremath{-}1}$. These findings are different from those of the well-characterized defect in the bulk silica thus evidencing structural peculiarities of …

β-ray irradiation effects on silica nanoparticles

2015

By electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) measurements, we examine the amplitude of the signal typically due to a combination of NBOHC (Non Bridging Hole Center) and POR (Peroxy Radical) defects induced by β-ray irradiation (from 1.2 to 1200 MGy) in silica nanoparticles with diameter ranging from 7 to 20 nm. Our data indicate that the signal line-shapes recorded at different doses is quite independent from the particles sizes and from the dose. Furthermore, for each considered nanoparticles size, the concentration of defects is also almost constant with respect to dose, and it does not change significantly if measured after 2 or 9 months from the irradiation. By contrast, we observed that th…

Luminescent defects induced by sintering of silica nanoparticles

2013

Enzyme-responsive intracellular-controlled release using silica mesoporous nanoparticles capped with ε-poly-L-lysine.

2014

The synthesis and characterization of two new capped silica mesoporous nanoparticles for controlled delivery purposes are described. Capped hybrid systems consist of MCM-41 nanoparticles functionalized on the outer surface with polymer epsilon-poly-L-lysine by two different anchoring strategies. In both cases, nanoparticles were loaded with model dye molecule [Ru(bipy)(3)](2+). An anchoring strategy involved the random formation of urea bonds by the treatment of propyl isocyanate-functionalized MCM-41 nanoparticles with the lysine amino groups located on the epsilon-poly-L-lysine backbone (solid Ru-rLys-S1). The second strategy involved a specific attachment through the carboxyl terminus of…

Self-limiting and complete oxidation of silicon nanostructures produced by laser ablation in water

2016

Oxidized Silicon nanomaterials produced by 1064 nm pulsed laser ablation in deionized water are investigated. High-resolution transmission electron microscopy coupled with energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy allows to characterize the structural and chemical properties at a sub-nanometric scale. This analysis clarifies that laser ablation induces both self-limiting and complete oxidation processes which produce polycrystalline Si surrounded by a layer of SiO2 and amorphous fully oxidized SiO2, respectively. These nanostructures exhibit a composite luminescence spectrum which is investigated by time-resolved spectroscopy with a tunable laser excitation. The origin of the observed luminescen…

Structural and in situ vibrational study of luminescent cluster assembled silicon thin films

2006

A Low Energy Cluster Beam Deposition apparatus is employed to produce cluster assembled silicon thin films (1-500 nm thick) by using a laser vaporization source. The generated clusters are studied since their formation through time of flight mass spectra and the calculated size in the gas phase are compared with those of the deposited aggregates obtained through Dynamic Scanning Force Microscopy. The deposited material is also studied "in situ" by Raman and infrared spectroscopy. The spectra reveal that the as deposited clusters are hydrogenated with negligible amount of oxide. A comparison of the film properties before and after their air exposure shows that the exposition induces a consis…

Degradation of silica particles functionalised with essential oil components under simulated physiological conditions

2020

[EN] In this work, the biodurability of three silica particle types (synthetic amourphous silica, MCM-41 microparticles, MCM-41 nanoparticles) functionalised with three different essential oil components (carvacrol, eugenol, vanillin) was studied under conditions that represented the human gastrointestinal tract and lysosomal fluid. The effect of particle type, surface immobilised component and mass quantity on the physico-chemical properties of particles and silicon dissolution was determined. Exposure to biological fluids did not bring about changes in the zeta potential values or particle size distribution of the bare or functionalised materials, but the in vitro digestion process partia…

Broadband photocurrent enhancement in a-Si:H solar cells with plasmonic back reflectors

2014

The authors acknowledge Francesco Ruffino for the AFM measurements. This work was funded by the EU FP7 Marie Curie Action FP7-PEOPLE-2010-ITN through the PROPHET project (Grant No. 264687), the bilateral CNR/AVCR project "Photoresponse of nanostructures for advanced photovoltaic applications", the MIUR project Energetic (Grant no. PON02_00355_3391233) and by the Portuguese Science Foundation (FCT-MEC) through the Strategic Project PEst-C/CTM/LA0025/2013-14 and the research project PTDC/CTM-ENE/2514/2012. Plasmonic light trapping in thin film silicon solar cells is a promising route to achieve high efficiency with reduced volumes of semiconductor material. In this paper, we study the enhance…

Optical tweezing using tunable optical lattices along a few-mode silicon waveguide

2018

International audience; Fourteen years ago, optical lattices and holographic tweezers were considered as a revolution, allowing for trapping andmanipulating multiple particles at the same time using laser light. Since then, near-field optical forces have arousedtremendous interest as they enable efficient trapping of a wide range of objects, from living cells to atoms, in integrateddevices. Yet, handling at will multiple objects using a guided light beam remains a challenging task for current on-chipoptical trapping techniques. We demonstrate here on-chip optical trapping of dielectric microbeads and bacteria usingone-dimensional optical lattices created by near-field mode beating along a f…