Properties of silver nanoparticles in the presence of dysprosium

Various methods of binding rare-earth metal ions with nanoparticles make it possible to obtain materials with new properties. The “green” synthesis method has been used for obtaining silver nanoparticles functionalized with Dy$^{3+}$ ions. The absorption and photoluminescence spectra of colloidal solutions have been measured, and the characteristics of resultant Ag nanoparticles have been analyzed using an electron microscope. The results of observations are in good agreement with the estimates obtained from the absorption spectra using the classical model. The nanoparticle shape (mainly spherical), size ($d$ = 70 nm), and volume fraction ($f$ = 6 $\times$ 10$^{-4}$) of silver in the colloidal solutions have been determined. Functionalizing silver nanoparticles with dysprosium ions with the help of the technique developed in this study can be extended to other rare-earth elements.