Synthesis, structural characterization and catalytic application of citrate-stabilized monometallic and bimetallic...

In this research work, copper (Cu), palladium (Pd) and their bimetallic palladium@ copper (Pd@Cu) nanoparticles were synthesized using trisodium citrate as a stabilizing agent using the known chemical reduction method. The synthesized Cu, Pd and Pd@Cu nanoparticles were characterized by the ultraviolet-visible spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction spectroscopy, respectively. The different volumes of trisodium citrate were used for the stability of synthesized monometallic Cu, Pd and bimetallic Pd@Cu nanoparticles. The synthesized Cu, Pd and their bimetallic Pd@Cu nanoparticles were used as catalysts for the reduction of 4-nitrophenol in the presence of NaBH₄. The bimetallic Pd@Cu nanoparticles had efficient catalytic activities with a high rate constant (1.812 min^-1) as compared to monometallic Cu (0.3322 min^-1) and Pd (0.2689 min^-1) nanoparticles, respectively. The correlation coefficient (R2) was found to be 0.99 for these three nanoparticles. Meanwhile, the effect of Cu, Pd and bimetallic Pd@Cu nanoparticles was checked on the physiology of specific different micro-organism strains. The bimetallic Pd@Cu nanoparticles reported the maximum resistance at maximum level the growth of bacterial strain and had observed a smooth antibacterial graph than the monometallic analogs.