Synthesis of metal nanopowders by reduction in organic liquids

Possibilities of the method of obtaining metal powders by means of thermal decomposition (or reduction) of their compounds during heating in a medium of a high-boiling organic liquid were investigated. A distinguishing feature of the approach proposed is the use of benzyl alcohol as the liquid medium, while the initial metal carboxylates with different lengths of the methylene chain were formates, caprylates and stearates. It was demonstrated in the present work that the proposed method can be successfully used to synthesize various metals including nickel, copper, silver, bismuth, and it provides the possibility to obtain the powders either in the micron state or in the submicron (nano-sized) ones. The possibility to synthesize powdered alloys of these metals was also demonstrated.