Recycling valuable silver from waste generated in diverse nanotemplate reactions

Abstract

The shape-controlled silver nanostructures have been widely used for template synthesis of metal nanostructures with desired morphologies and compositions for specific applications by galvanic replacement reaction, while the silver is sacrificed as oxidized to silver ion and abandoned as by-products. In view of the broad application prospect of the obtained metal nanostructures, the cost and environment problems after the template reactions should be taken into account for the large scale production in the future. To solve this problem, we conceptually demonstrate that the wasted AgCl generated from the template reactions can be easily recycled for the synthesis of valuable Ag nanowires. As representative examples, the average recovery of silver can be about 69.8%-84.6% after the template synthesis of Au/Pt nanostructures. The resynthesized Ag nanowires show uniform size distribution and excellent physical and chemical properties for the fabrication of transparent electrode and template synthesis.