Synthesis of monodisperse iron oxide and iron/iron oxide core/shell nanoparticles via iron-oleylamine complex

Monodisperse magnetic nanoparticles are of great scientific and technical interests. This paper reports a single-step synthesis of monodisperse magnetite nanoparticles with particle size of 8 nm. Iron/maghaemite core/shell nanoparticles with particle size of 11 nm were obtained by reducing the concentration of oleylamine. TEM and in-situ FTIR results suggested that iron-oleylamine intermediate was generated in-situ and decomposed at higher temperature. Oleylamine was also found on the surface of nanoparticles, indicating its role as capping agent which provided steric protection of as-synthesized nanoparticles from agglomeration. Both magnetite and iron/maghaemite core/shell nanoparticles were superparamagnetic at room temperature with a blocking temperature at 80 K and 67 K, respectively.