A facile and controllable protocol for simultaneous synthesis of magnetite nanoparticles and luminescent carbon dots

Both magnetic Fe3O4 nanoparticles (Fe3O4 NPs) and luminescent carbon dots (CDs) were simultaneously synthesized via a hydrothermal route at temperature as low as 200 °C. The synthesized magnetic Fe3O4 NPs and luminescent CDs were readily separated and purified from the reaction mixture, without the need for additional energy input and chemicals. The magnetic properties of purified Fe3O4 and photoluminescence (PL) behaviors of purified CDs were investigated using Squid-VSM magnetic property measurement system and fluorescence spectrophotometer, respectively. The size of Fe3O4 NPs and the luminescent properties of CDs were tunable by changing the reaction time or ratio between starting materials within a certain range. Fe3O4 NPs exhibited high saturation magnetization in the range of 36.59-68.22 emu/g and their magnetic behavior significantly depend on the size and structure of Fe3O4 NPs. This work was expected to provide a kind of green and high efficiency simultaneously synthesis of size-controllable Fe3O4 NPs and photoluminescence tunable CDs.