Shape of Metal Nanoparticles

In addition to their size and type, the shape of the nanoparticles can be engineered and controlled. Size of nanoparticles can be determined by the ration between the ingredients during the production step. From following figure it’s easy to assume that if we use higher ratio of gold in comparison to the other components will result in larger nanoparticles. Nano rods can be obtained by changing other synthesis conditions such as temperature during production process.  

In previous figure are shown the following gold nanoparticles:

• Small and large,
• Nanospeheres,
• Nanorods,
• Shaprened nanorods,
• Nanoshells,
• Nanocages,
• Hollow nanospheres,
• Cubes,
• Rhombic dodecahedra,
• Octahedra,
• Concave nanocubes,
• Tetrahexahedra,
• Rombic dodecahedra,
• Obtuse triangular bipyramids,
• Trisoctahedra,
• Nanoprisms.

For example nanoparticles found good application in biomedical field because of their desirable optical properties and potentially cargo-holding hollow structures that can be used for drug delivery.