Ultrathin Nanowires - A Materials Chemistry Perspective

The recent years have seen an explosive interest in one-dimensional nanostructures,([1]) as testified by the number of citations this field has accured; as customary, its blossoming was enabled by chemical breakthrough that allowed the reproducible and affordable synthesis of such structures. ([2,3]) The limitations of those syntheses was in the diameter of the nanowires that it could produce (hardly < 10 nm), and in the use of expensive and low-yield techniques, such as chemical vapor deposition (CVD). This paper attempts to summarize the very recent chemical breakthroughs that have allowed the production of ultrathin nanowires, often in solution, and often in gram-scale quantities. By no means is this a comprehensive coverage of the field, which can in part be found in other excellent reviews,([1,2,4-6]) but a selection of those contributions that we feel would most help put this emerging field in perspective. We will review the various synthetic strategies, their pros and cons, and we will give our best guesses as to the future directions of the field and what we can expect from it.