A novel Fe3O4-graphene-Au multifunctional nanocomposite: green synthesis and catalytic application

A facile, economical, and low-toxicity approach was proposed to coat gold nanoparticles (Au NPs) on the surface of graphene-encapsulated magnetic microspheres. The current method makes it possible to integrate Fe3O4 NPs and metal NPs with graphene without any interference or site competition. Dopamine serves as a reducing agent as well as a coupling agent for the assembly of reduced graphene oxide (RGO) and Au NPs on magnetic cores, so that no additional chemicals and thermal treatments are needed. The X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) results demonstrate that GO is successfully deoxygenated by the reduction of the PDA layer, while transmission electron microscopy (TEM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) results indicate that plenty of Au NPs (about 7.3 nm in diameter) are homogeneously distributed onto the surface of RGO and the Au content of the composite is 13.58 wt%. The high Au content endows the nanocatalyst with great catalytic performance towards the reduction of o-nitroaniline to benzenediamine by NaBH4 (completely transformation within 4 min). Furthermore, the as-prepared catalyst can be easily recovered and reused at least ten times due to the high magnetization and stability.