This article provides a detailed analysis of the synthesis, properties, and applications of nanoparticles (NPs), which exist in various forms. NPs are tiny materials with size ranges from 1 to 100 nm. They can be divided into different classes according to their properties and shapes. Different groups include fullerenes, metallic NPs, ceramic NPs, and polymeric NPs. Due to their large surface area and nanoscale size, NPs have unique physical and chemical properties. It is reported that their optical properties are size dependent and impart different colors in the visible range due to absorption. Their reactivity, toughness, and other properties also depend on their unique size, shape, and structure. These properties make them suitable candidates for a variety of commercial and household applications, including catalysis, imaging, medical applications, energy-based research, and environmental applications. Lead, mercury, and tin heavy metal NPs are reported to be rigid and stable so that their degradation is not easily achievable, which can lead to many environmental toxicities.
Nanotechnology has been a well-known research area for over a decade now. Since the introduction of nanotechnology by Nobel Prize winner Richard P. Feynman in his famous 1959 lecture known as ‘There is a lot of space on the ground’, there have been several revolutionary developments in the field of nanotechnology. Nanoparticles (NP) are a broad class of materials that contain particulate substances whose dimensions are at least 100 nm. Depending on the general shape, these materials can be in 0D, 1D, 2D, or 3D shape. The importance of these materials was recognized when researchers discovered that size can affect a substance's physicochemical properties, such as optical properties. The 20 nm gold (Au), platinum (Pt), silver (Ag) and palladium (Pd) NPs have the characteristic colors wine-red, yellow-gray, black and dark black. NPs of different sizes were synthesized.
NPs are not simple molecules and in fact, consist of three layers. The surface layer can be operated with a help of variety of small molecules, metal ions, surfactants and polymers. The cladding layer is chemically different from the core in all respects. Lastly, the core layer is essentially the central part of the NP and generally relates to the NP itself and because of these extraordinary properties, these materials received immense interest.
