Author(s)

R. Seoudi^1,2*, F. A. Al-Marhaby^3*

¹Spectroscopy Department, Physics Division, NRC, Cairo, Egypt.
²Department of Physics, College of Applied Science, Umm Al-Qura University, Makkah, Saudi Arabia.
³Department of Physics, University College in Qunfudah, Umm A-Qura University, Makkah, Saudi Arabia.

In this work, different sizes of gold nanoparticles were synthesized at room temperature by using trisodium citrate as a surfactant stabilizing agent and sodium borohydride as a reducing agent. Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) confirmed that the samples were synthesized in spherical shapes with three different particle sizes: 4 nm, 7 nm and 11 nm. Ultraviolet-visible spectra measurements were used to analyze the way that surface plasmon bands were affected by the different particles sizes. The effect of sphere size on photocatalytic reduction of 4-Nitrophenol was then studied and the rate constant of the reduction was calculated to be 0.014 s^-1, 0.0091 s^-1 and 0.003 s^-1 for particles sizes of 4 nm, 7 nm and 11 nm, respectively. The results obtained indicated that small particles were more active in catalytic reduction due to their high surface energy.

Gold Nanoparticles, Surface Plasmon Band, Photocatalyst, Rate Constant

Seoudi, R. and Al-Marhaby, F. (2016) Synthesis, Characterization and Photocatalytic Application of Different Sizes of Gold Nanoparticles on 4-Nitrophenol. World Journal of Nano Science and Engineering, 6, 120-128. doi: 10.4236/wjnse.2016.63012.