Investigation into the use of microfluidics in the manufacture of metallic gold-coated iron oxide hybrid nanoparticles

Hybrid iron oxide-gold nanoparticles are of increasing interest for applications in nanomedicine, photonics, energy storage, etc. However, they are often difficult to synthesise without experience or ‘know-how’. Additionally, standard protocols do not allow for scale up, and this is significantly hindering their future potential. In this study, we seek to determine whether microfluidics could be used as a new manufacturing process to reliably produce hybrid nanoparticles with the line of sight to their continuous manufacture and scaleup. Using a Precision Nano NanoAssemblr Benchtop® system, we were able to perform the intermediate coating steps required in order to construct hybrid nanoparticles around 60 nm in size with similar chemical and physical properties to those synthesised in the laboratory using standard processes, with Fe/Au ratios of 1:0.6 (standard) and 1:0.7 (microfluidics), indicating that the process was suitable for their manufacture with optimisation required in order to configure a continuous manufacturing plant.