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Updated: Feb 4, 2026

Liquid-cell Transmission Electron Microscopy for Tracking Self-assembly of Nanoparticles
Published on: October 16, 2017
Modulating the hierarchical fibrous assembly of Au nanoparticles with atomic precision
Qi Li1, Jake C Russell2, Tian-Yi Luo3
1Department of Chemistry, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, 15213, USA.
Abstract:
The ability to modulate nanoparticle (NP) assemblies with atomic precision is still lacking, which hinders us from creating hierarchical NP organizations with desired properties. In this work, a hierarchical fibrous (1D to 3D) assembly of Au NPs (21-gold atom, Au21) is realized and further modulated with atomic precision via site-specific tailoring of the surface hook (composed of four phenyl-containing ligands with a counteranion). Interestingly, tailoring of the associated counterion significantly changes the electrical transport properties of the NP-assembled solids by two orders of magnitude due to the altered configuration of the interacting π-π pairs of the surface hooks. Overall, our success in atomic-level modulation of the hierarchical NP assembly directly evidences how the NP ligands and associated counterions can function to guide the 1D, 2D, and 3D hierarchical self-assembly of NPs in a delicate manner. This work expands nanochemists' skills in rationally programming the hierarchical NP assemblies with controllable structures and properties.
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