Preparation of silver hollow nanostructures by plasmon-driven transformation

Herein we demonstrate the synthesis of silver spherical hollow nanostructures by the plasmon-driven transformation (PDTr) of partially agglomerated silver sol. The PDTr process was carried out in the presence of oxygen and trisodium citrate using intensive 550–650 nm light. In contrast to typical methods of the synthesis of metallic hollow nanostructures, no auxiliary template structures are used. Therefore, the obtained nanoshells should be less contaminated, which may be beneficial to their catalytic and optical properties. The method is believed to open up a straightforward route to the fabrication of nanoshells from metals which support surface plasmon resonance.