Tailored production of nanostructured metal/carbon foam by laser ablation of selected organometallic precursors

Aromatic, triphenylphosphine-containing organometallic compounds, as well as non-aromatic organometallic targets, were irradiated with a Nd:YAG laser to study the role of the metals and ligands used on the structure of the resulting materials. Characterization shows that the composition, metal nanoparticle dilution and crystallite size, and structure of the carbon foams (CFs) produced can be tailored by choosing the metals and ligands of the irradiated targets. The results indicate that precursors containing triphenylphosphine ligands tend to yield larger amounts of ablation products in which graphitic structures are observed in appreciably larger quantities. Electron microscopy reveals that these CFs are multi-component materials that consist of metal nanoparticles embedded in amorphous carbon aggregates, amorphous carbon nanoparticles, and graphitic nanostructures, which can be eventually observed as independent, separate components in the produced soots. The graphitic structures observed can also be produced by laser ablation of triphenylphosphine, indicating that their growth is not promoted by the metals of the chosen aromatic organometallic compounds.