Self-Assembling Nanoflasks Speed Up Chemical Reactions | AIChE

Self-Assembling Nanoflasks Speed Up Chemical Reactions

February
2016

The spaces between nanoparticles are not just empty voids. They can act as miniature flasks of sorts for speeding up chemical reactions.

Led by Rafal Klajn, an organic chemist at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel, a team of researchers has developed a way to create nanoparticles that self-assemble into clusters with nanoscale voids where reactions can take place. The scientists were inspired by nature’s use of confined spaces to perform fast, complex reactions with ease.

“Nature has long inspired chemists with its ability to stabilize ephemeral chemical species, perform chemical reactions at unprecedented rates and selectivities, and synthesize complex molecules and inorganic nano-structures with seemingly effortless ease,” the scientists say. “However, chemists and natural systems perform reactions in fundamentally different ways: Whereas chemists typically carry out reactions between molecules moving around freely in solution, natural systems consistently use the effect of nanoscale confinement.”

When spherical nanoparticles bunch together,...

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