| Nanocomposites are defined as multiphase material where at least one of the phases has a dimension in the nano-scale. There has been enormous interest in the commercialization of nanocomposites for a variety of applications including medical, electronic and structural.;The overall purpose of this study was on the formation of silver nanoparticles, due to the current interest surrounding these metals because of their unique properties which are different from the corresponding bulk material. Silver nanoparticles were capped with thiol terminated poly(ethyleneoxide) (PEO-SH) to stabilize the silver nanoparticles in solvent. Over the ranges considered the size of the silver particles formed did vary significantly with either PEO-SH concentration or temperature change; however some aggregation in the form of clusters was witnessed which were not as initially expected.;The synthesised silver nanoparticles, along with the composite films were characterised using UV-Visible spectrometry, X-ray diffraction studies (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and dynamic light scattering (DLS). The Uv-vis absorption and XRD should confirm the formation of silver particles whereas the XRD, SEM and TEM should indicate the size in nanometre (nm) range.;Varying concentrations of silver nanoparticles were dispersed in a polymethylmethacrylate, which were then ground down into a fine powder. Subsequent hot pressing resulted in thin, well dispersed homogenous nanostuctured films at varying concentrations targeted at above and below the percolation threshold. The reason for carrying out such an experiment was to observe the changes in electrical and optical properties, and the interaction parameters of the surface chemistry of the resulting composite at varying concentrations. Unfortunately the composite forming process led to silver nanoparticle aggregation and despite w/w loadings of 40 wt-% silver the volume -% was < 5 vol-% below the percolation threshold and hence all the composite films were insulating. |
