Deposition of Ag and Au-Ag alloy nanoparticle films by spray pyrolysis technique with tuned plasmonic properties

Silver (Ag) and gold-silver (Au-Ag) alloy nanoparticle films have been prepared on the transparent substrates using a simple inexpensive spray pyrolysis technique. The surface plasmon resonance (SPR) properties of Ag films were investigated by varying spray solution volume. Also, the tunability of SPR properties using an electric field to the nozzle was demonstrated in this work. The reduced full width at half maximum and blue shift in the SPR band position were observed with Delta lambda(FW) similar to 35 nm and Delta lambda(P) similar to 30 nm at the applied voltage of 2 kV. The extinction spectra of alloy nanoparticle films show only one plasmon absorption it is concluded that mixing of gold and silver precursors leads to a homogeneous formation of alloy nanoparticles. The maximum of the SPR band tuned continuously from lambda(max) similar to 414-525 nm with increasing gold content. The SEM observations show the variable size and spherical structure of nanoparticle films. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.