Thermal evolution of Pd- and Cu-based nanoclusters in SiO2

The control over size and composition of nanometer sized metallic clusters in SiO2 is of paramount importance for controlling their optical, magnetic and catalytic properties [1–6]. Among the available techniques for preparing mono- and bi-metallic nanoclusters in dielectric matrices, those based on ion implantation have been demonstrated to be very suitable [2, 3, 6–8]. In a recent paper [9] we have addressed the problem of the stability of Au-Cu nanoclusters obtained by sequential ion implantation in silica, under thermal treatment or ion irradiation. In this work we present results obtained in Pd- and/or Cu-based composite glasses obtained either by sequential ion implantation or by rf-sputtering.