Arab J Sci Eng DOI 10.1007/s13369-015-1609-x RESEARCH ARTICLE - CHEMISTRY Surface Reforming of Diamond Particles by the Dispersion Enhancement in Common Liquids Mirza Nadeem Ahmad · Khalid Mahmood Zia · Sohail Nadeem · Muhammad Naveed Anjum · Tahir Farooq · Khurram Shehzad · Adnan Mujahid · Tajamal Hussain · Mohammad Zuber · Yang Wantai Received: 25 October 2014 / Accepted: 4 February 2015 © King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals 2015 Abstract The dispersibility of diamond has been improved by reforming its surface with 2-propanol-2-yl [(CH 3 ) 2 C · OH] radicals. These radicals were produced by the photochemical breakdown of 1-[4-(2-hydroxyethoxy)-phenyl]-2-hydroxy- 2-methyl-1-propane-1-one (HPHMP) under ultraviolet (UV) radiations. The diamond particles were mixed with HPHMP in acetone and were placed under UV rays for the generation of required free radicals which were in situ reformed the dia- mond surface. Fourier transform infrared, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) confirmed the structural and surface reforming of di- amond. The thermogravimetric analysis, thermogravimetric analysis–mass spectrometry spectrogram confirmed the sur- face reforming of diamond with 2-propanol-2-yl radicals. The dispersion behavior of the diamond after reforming was observed by SEM analysis and revealed an improvement in dispersibility in common solvents. Keywords Diamond particles · Surface properties · Photochemical reforming · Enhanced dispersion M. N. Ahmad (B ) · K. Shehzad · Y. Wantai State Key Laboratory of Chemical Resource Engineering and College of Materials Science and Engineering, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing 100029, People’s Republic of China e-mail: pioneerravian@yahoo.com M. N. Ahmad · K. M. Zia · M. N. Anjum · T. Farooq · M. Zuber Institute of Chemistry, Government College University, Faisalabad 38030, Pakistan S. Nadeem Department of Chemistry, University of Management and Technology, Lahore 54000, Pakistan A. Mujahid · T. Hussain Institute of Chemistry, University of the Punjab, Lahore 54590, Pakistan 1 Introduction Surface modification using advanced techniques of polymer thin films for single wall carbon nanotube-based nanofluids and fabricated glass-filled polyamide have been reported in the established literature [1–3]. Reforming and characteriza- tion of graphite flakes and thermal, electrical, microstructure and microhardness properties of the eutectic magnesium–tin have been comprehensively reported [4, 5]. The work on car- bon fiber reinforced polymer cables and polymer–fullerene bulk heterojunction-based strain-sensitive flexible organic field-effect transistor has also been conducted by some of the researchers [6, 7]. Diamond is considered to be an important material in chemistry because of its tremendous properties which in- clude stability, hardness, wide-range wavelength transpare- ncy, high thermal conduction and large band gap [8, 9]. This is the reason that a number of researchers regarded diamond as industrially important material, which plays an important role in various fields [10]. The structure of diamond consists on a network of carbon atoms bonded to each other through sp 3 hybridization. It is true that structurally diamond consists of carbon atoms only; in addition to that its surface is further stabilized by bond- ing with other elements. The diamond surfaces terminated with hydrogen have been found to be hydrophobic in nature and p-type conducting. The composition-diamond lemma for free differential algebras has also been established [11]. But surface termination with oxygen turned it into hydrophilic and insulating in nature. It is evident that the chemical prop- erties of diamond depend mainly on the species present on its surface. The diamond surface modified with organo-metal complexes, simple organic functionalities and even enzymes have opened new horizons of novel applications in diversified fields of science [12, 13]. 123