Green synthesis of silver nanoparticles with sucrose and maltose: Morphological and structural characterization

We present a totally green approach toward the rapid synthesis and stabilization of metal nanoparticles through the treatment of aqueous solutions of silver nitrate with two commonly available sugars, i.e., maltose and sucrose as reducing agents. The average size, size distribution, morphology and internal crystalline structure of the nanoparticles are studied through high resolution transmission electron microscopy, selected-area diffraction pattern and UV–Vis spectroscopic technique and are seen to be critically dependent on the used sugar. The great majority of sucrose-assisted synthesized nanoparticles is distributed in a size range less than 6.0 nm, with an arithmetic media of 5.2 nm and a statistical standard deviation of 1.3 nm. For the maltose synthesized sample, the size distribution plot reveals that nanoparticles are greater (with a mean size of 62.4 nm and a standard deviation of 9.5 nm) and exhibit a more anisotropic morphology.