Localized surface plasmon resonance induced excellent solar-shielding ability for TiN nanoparticles-based hybrid polymer optical foils with high transparency

Titanium nitride (TiN), as a representative refractory plasmonic material , can arouse localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) absorption in visible region when its size is reduced to nanometer scale with good dispersion. Herein, a citric acid assisted sol-gel method was introduced to synthesize well-defined TiN nanoparticles which were well dispersed in organic solution and further applied to prepare organic-inorganic optical foils. The color of the hybrid film was not yellow but deep blue owing to the strong absorption peak of TiN nanoparticles near 730 nm, and meanwhile TiN nanoparticles-based foils possess a strong visible covering power even superior to that of carbon black. The small, well-dispersed TiN nanoparticles dispersed in polymer foil can make the thin film high transparent and available for some optical regulation fields like automobile, architecture and other non-linear optical fields. To sum up, this study has attempted to propose a general strategy way for making transparent composite optical foils directly by embedding the multifunctional inorganic nanomaterials into organic polymer hosts.