This paper describes thermally induced reshaping and coarsening behaviors of gold nanorods and nanoparticles immobilized on the surface of graphene oxide. Cetyltrimethylammonium bromide-stabilized gold nanorods with an aspect ratio of ∼3.5 (54:15 nm) and glutathione-capped gold nanoparticles with an average core size of ∼3 nm were synthesized and self-assembled onto the surface of graphene oxide. The hybrid materials were then heated at different temperatures ranging from 50 to 300 °C. The effects of heat treatments were monitored using UV-vis spectroscopy and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). These results were directly compared with those of heat-treated free-standing gold nanorods and nanoparticles without graphene oxide to understand the heat-induced morphological changes of the nanohybrids. The obtained results showed that the gold nanorods would undergo a complete reshaping to spherical particles at the temperature of 50 °C when they are assembled on graphene oxide. In comparison, the complete reshaping of free-standing gold nanorods to spherical particles would ultimately require a heating of the samples at 200 °C. In addition, the spherical gold nanoparticles immobilized on graphene oxide would undergo a rapid coarsening at the temperature of 100-150 °C, which was lower than the temperature (150-200 °C) required for visible coarsening of free-standing gold nanoparticles. The results indicated that graphene oxide facilitates the reshaping and coarsening of gold nanorods and nanoparticles, respectively, during the heat treatments. The stripping and spillover of stabilizing ligands promoted by graphene oxide are proposed to be the main mechanism for the enhancements in the heat-induced transformations of nanohybrids.
Keywords: coarsening; gold; graphene oxide; nanoparticles; nanorods; reshaping.