Spectroscopic evidence of a bidentate-binding of meso-2,3-dimercaptosuccinic acid on silver nanoclusters

New insight into the metal–ligand binding interaction in meso-2,3-dimercaptosuccinic acid (DMSA) protected silver nanoclusters (NCs) is presented in this work. IR, Raman and 13C NMR spectroscopic characterizations and DFT calculations suggest that DMSA forms a bidentate binding, rather than the originally-proposed monodentate binding, via two sulfur atoms with the underlying Ag7 NC, which is in agreement with recent ab initio calculations.