Physical Chemistry Commons^™

Global Minimum Search And Carbon Monoxide Binding Studies Of Novel Gold Nanoclusters, Navneet S. Khetrapal

Department of Chemistry: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

In bulk form, gold is a well-known noble metal. However, gold nanoparticles exhibit remarkable catalytic behavior towards various types of chemical reactions. These catalytic properties are highly dependent upon the size and shape and therefore knowledge of the geometries of these nanoparticles is of prime importance. The main goal of this dissertation is, therefore, going to be towards the elucidation of the structures of novel gold clusters using a combined experimental and theoretical approach and subsequent modeling to explore the binding of simple substrates like carbon monoxide with gold clusters. The theoretical method used to study the structural evolution of …