title: Functionalizing single crystals: incorporation of nanoparticles inside gel-grown calcite crystals.
abstract: Synthetic single crystals are usually homogeneous solids. Biogenic single crystals, however, can incorporate biomacromolecules and become inhomogeneous solids so that their properties are also extrinsically regulated by the incorporated materials. The discrepancy between the properties of synthetic and biogenic single crystals leads to the idea to modify the internal structure of synthetic crystals to achieve nonintrinsic properties by incorporation of foreign material. Intrinsically colorless and diamagnetic calcite single crystals are turned into colored and paramagnetic solids, through incorporation of Au and Fe3O4 nanoparticles without significantly disrupting the crystalline lattice of calcite. The crystals incorporate the nanoparticles and gel fibers when grown in agarose gel media containing the nanoparticles, whereas the solution-grown crystals do not. As such, our work extends the long-history gel method for crystallization into a platform to functionalize single-crystalline materials.
authors.affiliation: MOE Key Laboratory of Macromolecular Synthesis and Functionalization, State Key Laboratory of Silicon Materials, Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, 310027(China).
authors.forename: Yujing
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Wentao
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Yuan
authors.forename: Ye
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Shi
authors.forename: Xiaoqiang
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Yong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Hongzheng
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Hanying
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Li
mesh_terms: D002119:Calcium Carbonate / Q000737:chemistry*; D003460:Crystallization / Q000379:methods*; D020100:Hydrogels; D053758:Nanoparticles
chemical_list: D020100:Hydrogels; D002119:Calcium Carbonate
keywords: biomineralization; functionalization; hydrogels; nanoparticles; single crystals