Green synthesis of monodisperse silver nanoparticles using hydroxy propyl methyl cellulose

A simple and environmentally friendly method for the synthesis of highly stable and small sized silver nanoparticles with narrow distribution from 3   nm to 17   nm is reported. Silver nitrate, hydroxy propyl methyl cellulose (HPMC) and glucose, were used as silver precursor, capping agents and reducing agents respectively. The formation of silver nanoparticles was observed by change of color from colorless to wine red. The silver nanoparticles were characterized by transmission electron microscopy (TEM), UV–visible spectroscopy (UV–vis), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR). The results demonstrated that the obtained metallic nanoparticles were single crystalline silver nanoparticles capped with HPMC. The effects of the reaction time, reaction temperature and the concentration of silver ion and reducing agents on the particle size were investigated. A possible formation mechanism was proposed. The method may be extended to other noble metal for other technological applications such as additional medicinal, industrial applications.