One-step synthesis and stabilization of gold nanoparticles in water with the simple oxothiometalate Na-2[Mo-3(mu(3)-S)(mu-S)(3)(Hnta)(3)]

Na-2[Mo-3(mu(3)-S)(mu-S)(3)(Hnta)(3)] serves both as a reducing and a capping agent in the synthesis of Au nanoparticles in water at room temperature in a fully green chemistry-type process'', thus avoiding the usual two-step preparation of thiolate-monolayer-coated gold nanoparticles. The nanoparticles were characterized by TEM, DLS, UV-vis spectroscopy, XPS and XRD analyses and cyclic voltammetry.