Fabrication of Copper Nanoparticles: Advances in Synthesis, Morphology Control, and Chemical Stability

Metal nanoparticles have attracted great interest particularly because of the size dependence of physical and chemical properties and its enormous technological potential. Although most pioneering advancements refers to gold and silver, more recently there is growing interest in nanoparticles of copper, mostly due to its relatively low cost, which could allow the use of these small metal objects in large-scale nanotechnology applications, for example, antiseptics materials and metallic inks. However, the manufacture of copper nanoparticles stable in air with controlled size and shape has been a major challenge because of the relatively high reactivity of this element. Great efforts in getting the basic knowledge and synthesis know-how has gone into finding better ways to produce particles protected against oxidation and self-aggregation under normal conditions. In this review article, we briefly discuss a number of selected papers and recent patents on procedures and other issues related to the fabrication of copper nanoparticles.