Graphene oxide to help create nanocomposite materials with unique properties

Graduate student Alina Valimukhametova won a semester grant from the Tatarstan Academy of Sciences for her research in palladium nanoparticles.

"Nanoparticles of noble metals, including palladium, are among the most thoroughly studied group on nano-objects today thanks to their catalytic properties," says Ms. Valimukhametova.

She also studies iron nanoparticles, and her master degree research (research supervisor – Associate Professor Farit Vagizov) is titled "Mössbauer and structure research of the formation of iron nanoparticles with face-centered cubic grid."

Alina Valimukhametova is also a part of a group of scientists which has recently made a discovery together with German peers – stable gamma-iron under room temperature. Before the paper saw light, it had been considered that such a phenomenon could only observed at 917 C temperatures or above. Gamma-iron nanoparticles were grown on a graphene oxide substrate. Our interviewee conducted X-ray structural analysis and Mössbauer spectroscopy analysis of the nanoparticles.

"Under Senior Research Associate Ayrat Dimiev's guidance, our group managed to sustain gamma-iron nanoparticles under room temperature," says Ms. Valimukhametova. "It had earlier only been possible with chromium, nickel or manganese doping. In our composite, gamma-iron was produced together with alpha-iron. We are now working on producing pure gamma-iron for further characterization of its structured and applied use."

Provided by Kazan Federal University