Proceedings of the 1 st African International Conference/Workshop on Applications of Page 117 Nanotechnology to Energy, Health and Environment, UNN, March 23 – 29, 2014 Production and Characterization of Porous Gold 1,2 Olasupo Daniel Ogundare*,. 2 Mosobalaje Oyebanji Adeoye, 2,3 Adelana Rasaq Adetunji, 4 Olusegun Oyeleke Adewoye, 1 Engineering Materials Development Institute Akure Nigeria. 2 Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Obafemi Awolowo University Ile Ife Nigeria. 3 Prototype Engineering Development Institute Ilesa Nigeria. 4 African University of Science and Technology Abuja, Nigeria. * Coresponding author’s email address, phone number: suppiedee@yahoo.com, 08062208663. Abstract This work has presented an attempt at the production and characterization of porous gold by different procedures. The porousity was created as a result of mechanical attrition on the gold ore particles followed by acid leaching, carbon–in-leach gold extraction and carbon–in- leach gold extraction followed by double acid leaching and refining at 650°C. The porous gold samples obtained were characterized using Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) and X-Ray Diffractometer (XRD). The result showed that the carbon–in- leach gold extraction procedure followed by double acid leaching and refining at 650°C was the most promising. Keywords: Gold, porous gold, carbon-in- leach, mechanical attrition. Introduction Specific synthesis of nanoparticles and nanostructured materials are attracting attention in recent research because of their valuable properties which make them useful for catalysis [Narayanan and ElSayed,, 2004], sensor technology [Gomez-Romero, 2001], biological labeling [Shankar et al., 2003], optoelectronics recording media and optics [Qiu et al. 2004]. The size, shape and surface morphology play pivotal roles in controlling the physical, chemical, optical and electronic properties of these nanoscopic materials [Gracias et al., 2002; Kamat, 2002]. This is particularly important for noble metals such as gold (Au) and silver (Ag) which have strong surface plasmon resonance (SPR) oscillations. The shape- selective metal nanoparticles such as rods, tubes, wires, triangles, prisms, hexagons and cubes can be regularly synthesized by chemical, biological and physical methods. [El-Sayed, 2001; Lim et al., 2008] Many colloidal methods of synthesis have been approached to obtain metallic nanoparticles for this purpose, such as homogeneous reduction in aqueous solution [Shankar et al., 2004], or phase transfer reactions [Liz-Marzan & Philipse, 1995], with sodium citrate, hydrazine, NaBH4, and lithium triethylborohydride (LiBEt3H) as reducing agents, each of them yielding products with different physicochemical and structural characteristics [Han et al., 1998]. Among these, the polyol method has been reported to produce small nanoparticles as the final product, easily changing composition and surface modifiers. This technique does not require an additional reducing agent since the solvent by itself reduces the metallic species.