UCL Chemistry

Chris Blackman demonstrates a new gas-phase method for the one-step synthesis of metal nanoparticles supported on nanostructured metal oxides as a featured cover article in Advanced Functional Materials. With no requirement for substrate pre-treatment, this provides for direct integration of the co-deposited nanomaterial with device structures and it is utilized for the fabrication of selective gas microsensor arrays based on gold and platinum decorated tungsten oxide nanorods.

Gargi Dutta, Alexey A. Sokol*, C. Richard A. Catlow,
Thomas W. Keal, and Paul Sherwood

John William Draper – When the College opened in 1828, the Professor of Chemistry who was appointed was Edward Turner. One of his students was John William Draper who later emigrated to the United States and became professor of chemistry at New York University. He had a distinguished career, particularly in the new field of photography. He was the first to photograph the moon (1840) and the Great Orion Galaxy (1880), and he is known as the first astrophotographer.

Stephen D Price and colleagues have published a review article regarding the importance of ice research across a range of disciplines.

The ability of some organometallic compounds to form agostic bonds has been first recognises by M.L.H. Green and M. Brookhard in 1983. In this perspective contribution, a more personal look of how this area has developed over the last decades is reported.

This paper describes the use of combinatorial aerosol-assisted chemical vapour deposition (cAACVD) to deposit gallium-doped indium oxide thin films. The oxide films, Ga_xIn_2-xO₃, were deposited within composition graduated films from the aerosol-assisted CVD of GaMe₃, InMe₃ and HOCH₂CH₂OMe. Amorphous Ga₂O₃ was deposited closest to the inlet from the bubbler containing GaMe₃/HOCH₂CH₂OMe whereas crystalline In₂O₃ was grown on the substrate closest to the inlet from the bubbler containing InMe₃/HOCH₂CH₂OMe. A range of gallium-indium-oxide compositions, Ga_xIn_2-xO₃, were deposited on the substrate in the region between the two inlets. This allowed for a systematic investigation on the effect of doping on gallium and indium oxide and a direct relationship between composition and conductivity of the films was observed. This new technique combines the advantages of AACVD (volatility/thermal stability restrictions are removed) with those of cAPCVD/cLPCVD (rapid deposition/analysis of a compositional gradient). By utilizing a liquid-gas aerosol, as is employed in combinatorial AACVD, the restrictions of volatility and thermal stability are lifted and so new precursors and materials can be investigated.

Computer simulations reveal in the most exquisite detail how salt crystals dissolve in water.

Salt dissolution has a resonance with scientists and non-scientists alike being a piece of “chemistry” exploited daily to inhibit the freezing or accelerate the boiling of water. Despite this key role and increased contemporary drivers from e.g. nanotechnology and the desalination industry, the mechanism of salt dissolution has however remained elusive.

Highlight of a paper by Professor Angelos Michaelides and Dr Ben Slater

Computer simulations provide a molecule’s eye view of the melting of ice nanoparticles, predicting melting at very low temperatures.

Drs Schiffmann, Cora and Slater, in collaboration with partners at the University of Liverpool and Cambridge, report in Nature how structures of the emerging class of nanoporous cage materials can predicted using computer simulation techniques.