Abstract
It is commonly accepted that the combination of the anisotropic shape and nanoscale dimensions of the mineral constituents of natural biological composites underlies their superior mechanical properties when compared to those of their rather weak mineral and organic constituents1. Here, we show that the self-assembly of nearly spherical iron oxide nanoparticles in supercrystals linked together by a thermally induced crosslinking reaction of oleic acid molecules leads to a nanocomposite with exceptional bending modulus of 114 GPa, hardness of up to 4 GPa and strength of up to 630 MPa. By using a nanomechanical model, we determined that these exceptional mechanical properties are dominated by the covalent backbone of the linked organic molecules. Because oleic acid has been broadly used as nanoparticle ligand, our crosslinking approach should be applicable to a large variety of nanoparticle systems.
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Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge financial support from the German Research Foundation (DFG) via SFB 986 ‘M3’, projects A1, A2, A6 and Z3. We would especially like to thank R. Schön (Hamburg University), D. Weinert (Hamburg University) and R. Schwaiger (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology) for the SEM-, HRTEM- and SHIM-measurements. S. Jördens is thanked for critically reading the manuscript.
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A.D. had the idea for the thermal treatment of nanosupercrystals, developed the material preparation and chose the analytical methods. A.F. synthesized the particles, analysed by A.K. using SEM, HRTEM and SAED, as well as by A.M. using SAXS, all of whom were supervised by H.W. T.K and A.K. analysed the material by TEM and SAED. H.N. and A.S. performed and analysed UHV-IRRAS and XPS. C.J. prepared the microcantilevers and micropillars by FIB. E.D.Y. performed and evaluated the micromechanical tests. V.A. contributed to this work in many discussions with G.A.S. and H.W. G.A.S. formulated the original task, had the idea for the microcantilever and micropillar experiments, formulated the analytical nanomechanical model, wrote the framework of the paper and supervised the investigations. All authors participated during all stages of the process.
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Dreyer, A., Feld, A., Kornowski, A. et al. Organically linked iron oxide nanoparticle supercrystals with exceptional isotropic mechanical properties. Nature Mater 15, 522–528 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat4553
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat4553
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