A greener route to photoelectrochemically active PbS nanoparticles

A cheap and more environmentally friendly method for the synthesis of high quality PbS nanoparticles in olive oil at 60 'C has been developed. Carefully controlling the conditions of reactions leads to PbS nanoparticles with well-defined sizes, and band gaps between 1.72 and 0.88 eV. The nanoparticles were characterized by XRD, HRTEM, NIR absorption spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and a fluorescence lifetime experiment based on the time-correlated single photon counting (TCSPC) technique. Photoelectrochemical study carried out by steady-state current-voltage measurements of self-assembled PbS nanoparticles on ZnO-SnO(2) electrodes in 1 M Na(2)SO(3) electrolyte solution showed that as-prepared PbS nanoparticles were photochemically active.