Ultra-thin porous silica coated silver–platinum alloy nano-particle as a new catalyst precursor

Templated sol–gel encapsulation of surfactant-stabilised micelles containing metal precursor(s) with ultra-thin porous silica coating allows solvent extraction of organic based stabiliser from the composites in colloidal state hence a new method of preparing supported alloy catalysts using the inorganic silica-stabilised nano-sized, homogenously mixed, silver–platinum (Ag–Pt) colloidal particles is reported.