Gas-phase studies of chemically synthesized Au and Ag clusters

Atomically precise Au and Ag clusters protected by monolayers of organic ligands have attracted growing interests as promising building units of functional materials and ideal platforms to study size-dependent evolution of structures and physicochemical properties. The use of gas-phase methods including mass spectrometry, ion mobility mass spectrometry, collision-induced dissociation mass spectrometry, photoelectron spectroscopy, and photodissociation spectroscopy will reveal novel and complementary information on their intrinsic geometric and electronic structures that cannot be obtained by conventional characterization methods. This Perspective surveys the recent progress and outlook of gas-phase studies on chemically synthesized Au/Ag clusters.

Automated summary

Gas-phase methods offer novel insights into the intrinsic geometric and electronic structures of chemically synthesized Au/Ag clusters, which cannot be obtained by conventional characterization methods. This provides new perspectives for building functional materials and studying size-dependent structures.