PVP reduction

The cathodic reaction is the reduction of iodine to form lithium iodide at the carbon collector sites as lithium ions diffuse to the reaction site. The anode reaction is lithium ion formation and diffusion through the thin lithium iodide electrolyte layer. If the anode is cormgated and coated with PVP prior to adding the cathode fluid, the impedance of the cell is lower and remains at a low level until late in the discharge. The cell eventually fails because of high resistance, even though the drain rate is low. 

We have reported a simple, green, bench top, economical and environmentally benign room temperature synthesis of MSe (M=Cd or Zn) nanoparticles using starch, PVA and PVP as passivating agents. The whole process is a redox reaction with selenium acting as the oxidant and MSe as the reduction product. An entire "green" chemistry was explored in this synthetic procedure and it is reproducible. The optical spectroscopy showed that all the particles are blue shifted from the bulk band gap clearly due to quantum confinement. Starch capped CdSe nanoparticles showed the presence of monodispersed spherical... 

PVP, a water soluble amine-based pol5mer, was found to be an optimum protective agent because the reduction of noble metal salts by polyols in the presence of other surfactants often resulted in non-homogenous colloidal dispersions. PVP was the first material to be used for generating silver and silver-palladium stabilized particles by the polyol method [231-233]. By reducing the precur-sor/PVP ratio, it is even possible to reduce the size of the metal particles to few nanometers. These colloidal particles are isolable but surface contaminations are easily recognized because samples washed with the solvent and dried in the air are subsquently not any more pyrophoric [231,234 236]. 

Figure 10. Four different ways of controlling the kinetics of polyol reduction and the corresponding morphologies observed for the Pt nanostructures. As the same amount of PVP was present in all four syntheses illustrated here, the striking differences in morphology were not caused by variation in the PVP concentration. It is assumed that the PVP molecules in these syntheses function only as a stabilizer to prevent the resultant nanoparticles from aggregating into larger structures. (Reprinted from Ref [270], 2005, with permission from Wiley-VCH.)...

Late transition metal or 3d-transition metal irons, such as cobalt, nickel, and copper, are important for catalysis, magnetism, and optics. Reduction of 3d-transition metal ions to zero-valent metals is quite difficult because of their lower redox potentials than those of noble metal ions. A production of bimetallic nanoparticles between 3d-transi-tion metal and noble metal, however, is not so difficult. In 1993, we successfully established a new preparation method of PVP-protected CuPd bimetallic nanoparticles [71-73]. In this method, bimetallic hydroxide colloid forms in the first step by adjusting the pH value with a sodium hydroxide solution before the reduction process, which is designed to overcome the problems caused by the difference in redox potentials. Then, the bimetallic species... 

Our first attempt of a successive reduction method was utilized to PVP-protected Au/Pd bimetallic nanoparticles [125]. An alcohol reduction of Pd ions in the presence of Au nanoparticles did not provide the bimetallic nanoparticles but the mixtures of distinct Au and Pd monometallic nanoparticles, while an alcohol reduction of Au ions in the presence of Pd nanoparticles can provide AuPd bimetallic nanoparticles. Unexpectedly, these bimetallic nanoparticles did not have a core/shell structure, which was obtained from a simultaneous reduction of the corresponding two metal ions. This difference in the structure may be derived from the redox potentials of Pd and Au ions. When Au ions are added in the solution of enough small Pd nanoparticles, some Pd atoms on the particles reduce the Au ions to Au atoms. The oxidized Pd ions are then reduced again by an alcohol to deposit on the particles. This process may form with the particles a cluster-in-cluster structure, and does not produce Pd-core/ Au-shell bimetallic nanoparticles. On the other hand, the formation of PVP-protected Pd-core/Ni-shell bimetallic nanoparticles proceeded by a successive alcohol reduction [126]. 

Vinodgopal et al. prepared Pt/Ru bimetallic nanoparticles by sonochemical reduction of Pt(II) and Ru(III) in aqueous solutions. TEM images indicated that sequential reduction of the Pt(II) followed by the Ru(III) produced Pt-core/Ru-shell bimetallic nanoparticles. In the presence of sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS), as a stabilizer, the nanoparticles had diameters between 5 and 10 nm. When PVP was used as the stabilizer, the rate of reduction is much faster, giving ultrasmall bimetallic nanoparticles of ca. 5nm diameter [141]. 

Reduction of two different precious metal ions by refluxing in ethanol/water in the presence of PVP gave a colloidal dispersion of core/shell structured bimetallic nanoparticles. In the case of Pd and Au ions, e.g., the colloidal dispersions of bimetallic nanoparticles with a Au core/Pd shell structure are produced. In contrast, it is difficult to prepare bimetallic nanoparticles with the inverted core/shell (in this case, Pd-core/Au-shell) structure. The sacrificial hydrogen strategy was used to construct the inverted core/shell structure, where the colloidal dispersions of Pd-cores are treated with hydrogen and then the solution of the second element, Au ions, is slowly added to the dispersions. This novel method, developed by us, gave the inverted core/shell structured bimetallic nanoparticles. The Pd-core/Au-shell structure was confirmed by FT-IR spectra of adsorbed CO [144]. 

In 1993, we examined formation processes of PVP-protected AuPt bimetallic nanoparticles by in-situ UV-Vis spectroscopy during the reduction [53]. Figure 8 shows the in-situ UV-Vis spectra during the simultaneous reduction of Au(III) and Pt(IV) ions. In the case of PVP-protected AuPt bimetallic system, Au(III) ions are... 

In 1989, we developed colloidal dispersions of Pt-core/ Pd-shell bimetallic nanoparticles by simultaneous reduction of Pd and Pt ions in the presence of poly(A-vinyl-2-pyrrolidone) (PVP) [15]. These bimetallic nanoparticles display much higher catalytic activity than the corresponding monometallic nanoparticles, especially at particular molecular ratios of both elements. In the series of the Pt/Pd bimetallic nanoparticles, the particle size was almost constant despite composition and all the bimetallic nanoparticles had a core/shell structure. In other words, all the Pd atoms were located on the surface of the nanoparticles. The high catalytic activity is achieved at the position of 80% Pd and 20% Pt. At this position, the Pd/Pt bimetallic nanoparticles have a complete core/shell structure. Thus, one atomic layer of the bimetallic nanoparticles is composed of only Pd atoms and the core is completely composed of Pt atoms. In this particular particle, all Pd atoms, located on the surface, can provide catalytic sites which are directly affected by Pt core in an electronic way. The catalytic activity can be normalized by the amount of substance, i.e., to the amount of metals (Pd + Pt). If it is normalized by the number of surface Pd atoms, then the catalytic activity is constant around 50-90% of Pd, as shown in Figure 13. 

Recently, Somorjai, Yang et al. [143] examined this reaction over lwt.% Pt/SBA-15 utilizing an elaborate preparation protocol. Preformed Pt nanoparticle sols of five different mean sizes, obtained by alcohol reduction in the presence of a protecting polymer (PVP) were combined with SBA-15 silica exhibiting 9nm pores. After 3h low-power ultrasonic treatment, the Pt particles were evenly distributed throughout the pores of the support (Figure 12 (a)-(e)). 

The reduction of metal hydroxides or oxides powder by polyol was first reported by Figlarz and co-workers, which gave rise to fine powders of Cu, Ni, Co and some noble metals with micrometer sizes (polyol process) [32,33]. The polyol process was first modified for the preparation of PVP-protected bimetallic and monometallic nanoclusters such as Pt/Cu, Pd/Pd, Pt/Co, Pt, Pd, etc. [34-38]. The previous results definitely revealed that Pt, Pd, Cu and Co in these PVP-protected metal or alloy nanoclusters were in a zero-valent metallic state. 

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