The present invention relates to a nanocluster liquid dispersion where nanoclusters with a predetermined number of atoms are dispersed.

The present invention relates to a method for the preparation of a colloidal aqueous suspension of stable zeolite nanocrystals having framework structures comprising at least one cation selected from Gd, Fe, Cu and Ce, said structures being loaded with a gas selected from O.sub.2, CO.sub.2 and mixtures thereof, to the colloidal aqueous suspension of zeolite nanocrystals obtained by such a process, and to the use of said suspension in therapy, more particularly in cancer therapy and hypoxia-related diseases and/or in diagnosis.

The present invention relates to a method for preparing an aqueous or hydro-alcoholic colloidal solution of metal chalcogenide amorphous nanoparticles notably of the Cu.sub.2ZnSnS.sub.4 (CZTS) type and to the obtained colloidal solution.

The present invention also relates to a method for manufacturing a film of large-grain crystallized semi-conducting metal chalcogenide film notably of CZTS obtained from an aqueous or hydro-alcoholic colloidal solution according to the invention, said film being useful as an absorption layer deposited on a substrate applied in a solid photovoltaic device.

Urea and amine comprising sol-gel hybrid coatings have been developed for numerous applications, including capillary microextraction-high performance liquid chromatographic analysis from aqueous samples. A fused silica capillary may be coated from the inside with surface bonded coating material and may be created by in-situ sol-gel reaction(s). Urea-functionalized coatings can be immobilized on the inner surface of a capillary by condensing silanol groups of capillary and sol-solution. Urea functionalized, sol-gel coated capillaries may be installed, e.g., in HPLC manual injection ports, and optionally pre-concentrated analytes including phenols, ketones, aldehydes, and/or polyaromatic hydrocarbons, from highly polar to non-polar, maybe analyzed by online extraction and high-performance liquid chromatographic. Such coatings may achieve sensitivities with lower detection limits (S/N=3) of 0.10 ng/mL to 14.29 ng/mL, with reproducibilities of <12.0% RSD (n=3), or <10.0% RSD (n=3) by exchanging the capillary of the same size.

A system for controlling the ion content of a colloidal system. A porous deionizer is used to selectively remove and isolate ions from a colloidal system. The colloidal particles within the system have their attraction/repulsion tuned by control of the ion content to alter the interaction between the colloidal particles.

The present invention relates to a method for preparing an aqueous or hydro-alcoholic colloidal solution of metal chalcogenide amorphous nanoparticles notably of the Cu.sub.2ZnSnS.sub.4 (CZTS) type and to the obtained colloidal solution. The present invention also relates to a method for manufacturing a film of large-grain crystallized semi-conducting metal chalcogenide film notably of CZTS obtained from an aqueous or hydro-alcoholic colloidal solution according to the invention, said film being useful as an absorption layer deposited on a substrate applied in a solid photovoltaic device.

Provided herein is a method of preparing a ceramic material, the method including: providing a ceramic gel including a plurality of metal salts and compressing the ceramic gel thereby inducing stress-induced mineralization of the ceramic gel and formation of the ceramic material, wherein the ceramic gel exists in isolated form.

An object of the present invention is to provide a dispersion of a zirconium element-containing metal oxide having high transparency and low viscosity even at high concentration. The present invention relates to a method of producing a zirconium element-containing metal oxide dispersion, and the production method includes a step of heating a slurry containing a zirconium element-containing compound as a metal element-containing compound to perform a hydrothermal reaction, in which the heating in the hydrothermal reaction step is performed at a temperature rising rate of 90? C./hour or more.

The present invention is a metal colloid solution comprising: colloidal particles consisting of metal particles consisting of one or two or more metal(s) and a protective agent bonding to the metal particles; and a solvent as a dispersion medium of the colloidal particles, wherein: a chloride ion concentration per a metal concentration of 1 mass % is 25 ppm or less; and a nitrate ion concentration per a metal concentration of 1 mass % is 7500 ppm or less. In the present invention, adsorption performance can be improved with adjustment of the amount of the protective agent of the colloidal particles. It is preferable to bind the protective agent of 0.2 to 2.5 times the mass of the metal particles.

Provided is a method for the preparation of a porous hollow shell WO.sub.3/WS.sub.2 nanomaterial, comprising: (1) adding a hexavalent tungsten salt to a sol A comprising mesocarbon microbeads, and stirring to obtain a sol B; (2) drying and grinding the sol B, and then heating a resulting powder at 200-500 C. for 0.5-2 hours to obtain a porous hollow shell WO.sub.3 nanocrystalline material; (3) placing the porous hollow shell WO.sub.3 nanocrystalline material obtained by Step 2 and a sulfur powder separately in a vacuum furnace, controlling such that a degree of vacuum is 0.01 to 0.1 MPa and a temperature is 200-500 C., and reacting for 0.5-3 hours to obtain a WO.sub.3/WS.sub.2 porous hollow shell nanocrystalline material. Also provided is a porous hollow shell WO.sub.3/WS.sub.2 nanocrystalline material obtained by the method.