Continuous synthesis of organic-inorganic hybridized cubic nanoassemblies of octahedral cerium oxide nanocrystals and hexanedioic acid.

We synthesized cubic nanoassemblies of octahedral CeO(2) nanocrystals by simply heating an aqueous solution of cerium nitrate (Ce(NO(3))(3)) in the presence of hexanedioic acid (HOOC(CH(2))(4)COOH) in a lab-scale plug-flow reactor. It was concluded that the octahedral shape of the primary CeO(2) nanocrystals plausibly leads to octa-coordination of the primary nanocrystals, thus enabling controlled assembly to form a cubic structure.