Characterization of CdS nanoparticles during their growth in paraffin hot-matrix

This paper describes the optical and structural properties of CdS nanoparticles during their growth in paraffin hot-matrix containing stearic acid ligand. The nanocrystalline species are characterized with absorbance and photoluminescence spectroscopy, fluorescence microscopy, High-Resolution Transmission Electron Microscopy and X-ray diffraction. The nanoparticles size-distribution, Stokes shift and mean molar concentration are derived from the optical spectra as functions of time. Their time evolution confirms a two-stage nanocrystal growth for CdS. The stability of aggregates of stearate-coated nanoparticles, tested against UV-illumination, shows that the band-edge emission is more sensitive to photo bleaching than the trap-state emission. The obtained new quantitative results are important for the large-scale manufacturing of CdS nanoparticles and their practical applications.