A generally synthetic route to semiconducting metal sulfide nanocrystals by using corresponding metal powder and cysteine as metallic and sulfuric sources, respectively

The economical and large-scale preparations of metallic sulfides nanocrystals (NCs) would determine their practical industrial application. In this contribution, a series of sulfides NCs such as ZnS, CdS, PbS, Cu_xS, MnS and Bi₂S₃, have been harvested by thermolysis of a single source metal cysteinate obtained conveniently from the reaction between metal powder and cysteine in aqueous environment and constant atmosphere in glassware. The characterizations including TEM, XRD, UV-Vis, FT-IR, TG-DSC, EDX and BET confirmed that the as-synthesized products are from the decomposition of metal cysteinate, of nanoscale in size, and of mesoporous materials. The generation, low cost and benign environment made this route technologically and scientifically interesting for the preparation of metallic sulfides NCs.