Size-controlled palladium dendritic nanocrystals and their electrocatalytic property toward formic acid oxidation and SERS performance

Abstract The size control of Pd dendritic nanoparticles (Pd-DNPs) is achieved with ascorbic acid as a reducing agent and cetyltrimethylammonium chloride (CTAC) as a surfactant by concentration. The size of Pd-DNPs can be controlled within the range of 38–88 nm by varying the amount of CTAC. Palladium nanoparticles are shown to have significantly increased in size due to the effect of dendritic pods and size with formic acid oxidation in the room temperature. The enhanced electrocatalytic properties of the Pd-DNPs are attributed to the presence of high surface. Moreover, the size controlled Pd-DNPs show enhanced intensity under surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy via hot-spot or surface plasmon resonance (SPR) effects.