Preparation and isolation of gold nanoparticles coated with a stabilizer and sol-gel compatible agent

In this work an attractive technique is presented that brings together the advantage of the micelle reverse technique to control the particle growth and the efficiency of the amine silanes as sol-gel-compatible surface modifiers. The diamino silane is far from being a passive agent in the formation process of the gold particle; it strongly modifies the growth of the gold particle in the reverse micelle. The diamino silane allows the gold particles to keep their individual properties unaltered throughout the process, which ends with their incorporation into a SiO₂–TiO₂ sol-gel thin film.