Facile deposition of continuous gold shells on Tween-20 modified FeO superparticles.

A facile method to deposit continuous Au shells on FeO colloidal superparticles was developed by introducing Tween-20 as a surface modification agent to maintain the colloidal stability of the FeO superparticles and provide nucleation and growth sites for the Au shells. The FeO-Au core-shell particles showed excellent chemical stability, superparamagnetic properties and efficient photothermal conversion performance under laser irradiation at 808 nm, and were expected to be a useful material for biodetection and cancer therapy.