GOLD FINE PARTICLES-NYLON COMPOSITE - PREPARATION OF GLASS CONTAININGGOLD MICROCRYSTALS

A nylon composite containing Au fine particles was prepared through th e relaxative auto-dispersion (RAD) process. Nylon 11 and Au were conse cutively deposited on a glass substrate in vacuum to form a Au/nylon l aminated film. The upper Au layer of the laminated film was rapidly di spersed, through heat treatment at temperatures between the alpha-disp ersion temperature and the melting temperature of the nylon, into the lower nylon layer in the form of fine particles, whose diameters were found to be as small as 1 approximately 10 nm. After the beat treatmen t at 120-degrees-C for 4 min, Au particles were uniformly distributed from the surface to the bottom of the nylon film of 30 mum thick. Au f ine particles were assumed to be dispersed into the nylon owing to the thermal relaxation of nylon which had at first been put in a metastab le state by the vapor deposition. The Au-nylon composite was mixed wit h glass powder in cresol. The mixture was printed on an Al2O3 Substrat e and was dried. Finally the mixture was fired at 600-degrees-C for 30 min to form the glass film containing Au. The glass containing a smal l amount of TiO2 or Al2O3 Was found to fix Au microcrystals in itself without any aggregation of Au, and the plasmon band of Au in the glass shifted to a longer wavelength. We assume that the fixation of Au mic rocrystals in the glass was caused by the strong interaction between t he microcrystals and TiO2 or Al2O3.