Green Wet Chemical Route for the Synthesis of Silver and Palladium Dendrites

A novel and very effective wet chemical route for the preparation of metal dendritic nanostructures was developed by starting from VOSO4 and Ag2SO4 (or K2PdCl4) in aqueous solution at room temperature. No template or surfactant was used. VOSO4 serves as the reducing agent for the silver salt, and the resulting silver nanoparticles and nanocrystallites are then arranged into dendritic structures. The morphologies of the dendrites are found to be heavily influenced both by the molar ratio and the concentrations of the reactants. Observation of symmetric and asymmetric dendrites with variations of these parameters supports the proposal that diffusion and oriented attachment of silver nanoparticles or crystallites might compete, to various extents, and dictate the final morphologies of dendritic nanostructures. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first example of a surfactant-free, template-free, fully inorganic wet chemical route to metal dendritic structures. The method was also successful in the preparation of palladium nanodendrites.