Chitosan Coupled Silver Nanoparticles Electrocatalyst Synthesis and Characterization

Ikisiri

This study sought to find a suitable technique for synthesizing and characterizing silver nanoparticles due to its applications in various fields such as nanotechnology and medical. The synthesized silver nanoparticles were characterized using SEM microscopy, FT-IR and UV-Vis spectroscopy. The maximum absorbance from the UV-Vis spectrophotometer showed the formation of silver nanoparticles with λ max of 418 nm. The FTIR analysis envisaged a strong symmetrical stretching at 1400 cm-1 to 1200 cm-1 with the major peaks recorded at 1390 cm-1 and 1380 cm-1, indicating the presence of nitro components in the sample. The signal at 1658 cm−1 corresponded to the amide (C=O) bonds stretching vibrations, at 1089 cm−1 C-O-C bonds and at 564 cm−1 plane with bends NH, plane-out and bends C−O.  C-H stretching vibrational signal was noted at 2927 cm−1, and a broader band at 3426 cm−1 with an overlap between the O−H stretching vibration and N−H stretching vibration of the oligosaccharide applied in the capping. The concentration of chitosan on transmittance was done using 0.5%, 1.0%, 1.5% and 2.0% solutions with the results from FT-IR showing elaborate intensity at 2.0 % chitosan capping and the least at 0.5 %. Scanning microscope validated characterized silver nanoparticles morphology at 500nm.  The results obtained from SEM depicted a size range of 100 nm with resolutions between 0.5 to 4 nm