Leeds team synthesise world's thinnest gold

The 2D material, which consists of two layers of atoms sitting on top of each other in a sheet, has been developed by researchers at Leeds University.

The material could be used to create extremely sensitive home biomedical testing devices, as well as in pharmaceutical development and waste water treatment, according to Dr Sunjie Ye, from Leeds' Molecular and Nanoscale Physics Group and the Leeds Institute of Medical Research. Ye is lead author of a paper describing the work, which was published in the journal Advanced Science.

To synthesise the material, the researchers added chloroauric acid, an inorganic substance containing gold, and a reducing agent, sodium citrate acid aqueous solution, into a solution of a “confinement agent”, methyl orange.

After being kept undisturbed for 12 hours at an ambient temperature, the chloroauric acid was reduced to its metallic form, with the confinement agent having encouraged the gold to form a two atom-thick sheet, said Ye.