Facile one-pot synthesis of γ-Fe2O3 nanoparticles by inductive heating

Abstract

The direct one-pot synthesis of γ-Fe₂O₃ nanoparticles (NPs) has been demonstrated through a facile inductive heating method. Acetylferrocene, a solid precursor, has been used for the first time to the best of our knowledge during the synthesis. Traditionally, solid precursors have not been used in the hot-injection (HI) technique because of their limited solubility and less likely outcome to produce the high supersaturation needed for diffusion-limited growth of the NPs. Oleylamine and trioctylamine serve as a solvent, a binding ligand, and a reducing agent in the synthesis to produce γ-Fe₂O₃ NPs with relatively narrow size distribution. The structures, morphologies, and magnetic properties of γ-Fe₂O₃ NPs are studied. The phase pure γ-Fe₂O₃ NPs obtained display uniform morphology and good magnetic property. Therefore, the inductive heating technique has the potential to provide an industrial level scale-up synthesis in continuous reactors, which is not available for the HI method relying on batch synthesis.