Fabrication of fully covered Cu–Ag core–shell nanoparticles by compound method and anti-oxidation performance

Cu-Ag core-shell nanoparticles with a size of 8 nm were synthesized by the compound method of replacement reaction and chemical reduction reaction. A fully covered Cu-Ag core-shell structure was obtained by controlling the two different silver sources and electroless silver plating time. The optimum condition uses silver ammonia reacted for 14 h. The process of electroless silver plating uses the mixed growth model of layered growth and island growth. Silver atoms firstly attach to the surface of the as-prepared copper nanoparticles to form the dotted Ag atom structure by galvanic displacement reaction between Cu and [Ag(NH3)2]+, and then more silver atoms, reduced by sodium citrate, gradually deposit on the copper surface to form a fully covered structure. The morphology and core-shell structure of the nanoparticles was observed by scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy and x-ray diffraction. The simultaneous thermal analyzer results confirmed that the weight gain of Cu-Ag core-shell nanoparticles was 2.2% when heated up to 400 °C, which was lower than pure Cu nanoparticles. According to the x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy results, the Cu-Ag core-shell nanoparticles exhibited good anti-oxidation performance compared with the pure copper nanoparticles after being stored for one month under the ambient conditions.