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Solar induced growth of silver nanocrystals

The effect of solar irradiation on plasmonic silver nanocrystals has been investigated using Transmission Electron Microscopy and size distribution analysis, in the context of solar cell applications for light harvesting. Starting from an initial collection of spherical nanocrystals on a carbon film whose sizes are log-normally distributed, solar irradiation causes the nanocrystals to grow, with one particle reaching a diameter of 638 nm after four hours of irradiation. In addition some of the larger particles lose their spherical shape. The average nanocrystal diameter was found to grow as predicted by the Ostwald ripening model, taking into account the range of area fractions of the samples. The size distribution stays approximately log-normal and does not reach one of the steady-state size distributions predicted by the Ostwald ripening model. This might be explained by the system being in a transient state.