Critical assessment of the evidence for striped nanoparticles
There is now a significant body of literature which reports that stripes form in the ligand shell of suitably functionalised Au nanoparticles. This stripe morphology has been proposed to strongly affect the physicochemical and biochemical properties of the particles. We critique the published eviden...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
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Public Library of Science
2014
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| Online Access: | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/31733/ |
| _version_ | 1848794262898999296 |
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| author | Shankar, Sangaru Shiv Stirling, Julian Lekkas, Ioannis Sweetman, Adam Djuranovic, Predrag Guo, Quanmin Pauw, Brian Granwehr, Josef Lévy, Raphaël Moriarty, Philip |
| author_facet | Shankar, Sangaru Shiv Stirling, Julian Lekkas, Ioannis Sweetman, Adam Djuranovic, Predrag Guo, Quanmin Pauw, Brian Granwehr, Josef Lévy, Raphaël Moriarty, Philip |
| author_sort | Shankar, Sangaru Shiv |
| building | Nottingham Research Data Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | There is now a significant body of literature which reports that stripes form in the ligand shell of suitably functionalised Au nanoparticles. This stripe morphology has been proposed to strongly affect the physicochemical and biochemical properties of the particles. We critique the published evidence for striped nanoparticles in detail, with a particular focus on the interpretation of scanning tunnelling microscopy (STM) data (as this is the only technique which ostensibly provides direct evidence for the presence of stripes). Through a combination of an exhaustive re-analysis of the original data, in addition to new experimental measurements of a simple control sample comprising entirely unfunctionalised particles, we show that all of the STM evidence for striped nanoparticles published to date can instead be explained by a combination of well-known instrumental artefacts, or by issues with data acquisition/analysis protocols. We also critically re-examine the evidence for the presence of ligand stripes which has been claimed to have been found from transmission electron microscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, small angle neutron scattering experiments, and computer simulations. Although these data can indeed be interpreted in terms of stripe formation, we show that the reported results can alternatively be explained as arising from a combination of instrumental artefacts and inadequate data analysis techniques. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:13:24Z |
| format | Article |
| id | nottingham-31733 |
| institution | University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:13:24Z |
| publishDate | 2014 |
| publisher | Public Library of Science |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | nottingham-317332020-05-04T16:57:29Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/31733/ Critical assessment of the evidence for striped nanoparticles Shankar, Sangaru Shiv Stirling, Julian Lekkas, Ioannis Sweetman, Adam Djuranovic, Predrag Guo, Quanmin Pauw, Brian Granwehr, Josef Lévy, Raphaël Moriarty, Philip There is now a significant body of literature which reports that stripes form in the ligand shell of suitably functionalised Au nanoparticles. This stripe morphology has been proposed to strongly affect the physicochemical and biochemical properties of the particles. We critique the published evidence for striped nanoparticles in detail, with a particular focus on the interpretation of scanning tunnelling microscopy (STM) data (as this is the only technique which ostensibly provides direct evidence for the presence of stripes). Through a combination of an exhaustive re-analysis of the original data, in addition to new experimental measurements of a simple control sample comprising entirely unfunctionalised particles, we show that all of the STM evidence for striped nanoparticles published to date can instead be explained by a combination of well-known instrumental artefacts, or by issues with data acquisition/analysis protocols. We also critically re-examine the evidence for the presence of ligand stripes which has been claimed to have been found from transmission electron microscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, small angle neutron scattering experiments, and computer simulations. Although these data can indeed be interpreted in terms of stripe formation, we show that the reported results can alternatively be explained as arising from a combination of instrumental artefacts and inadequate data analysis techniques. Public Library of Science 2014-11-14 Article PeerReviewed Shankar, Sangaru Shiv, Stirling, Julian, Lekkas, Ioannis, Sweetman, Adam, Djuranovic, Predrag, Guo, Quanmin, Pauw, Brian, Granwehr, Josef, Lévy, Raphaël and Moriarty, Philip (2014) Critical assessment of the evidence for striped nanoparticles. PLoS ONE, 9 (11). e108482/1-e108482/18. ISSN 1932-6203 http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0108482 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0108482 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0108482 |
| spellingShingle | Shankar, Sangaru Shiv Stirling, Julian Lekkas, Ioannis Sweetman, Adam Djuranovic, Predrag Guo, Quanmin Pauw, Brian Granwehr, Josef Lévy, Raphaël Moriarty, Philip Critical assessment of the evidence for striped nanoparticles |
| title | Critical assessment of the evidence for striped nanoparticles |
| title_full | Critical assessment of the evidence for striped nanoparticles |
| title_fullStr | Critical assessment of the evidence for striped nanoparticles |
| title_full_unstemmed | Critical assessment of the evidence for striped nanoparticles |
| title_short | Critical assessment of the evidence for striped nanoparticles |
| title_sort | critical assessment of the evidence for striped nanoparticles |
| url | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/31733/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/31733/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/31733/ |