Facile Preparation and Self-Assembly of Monodisperse Polystyrene Nanospheres for Photonic Crystals.

We have developed boiling emulsifier-free emulsion polymerization recipes for the synthesis of monodisperse polystyrene (PS) nanospheres with diameters between ca. 100 and 300 nm. The morphologies of the nanospheres during growth were characterized and the results showed that the PS nanospheres with uniform structures could be synthesized rapidly by modifying the reaction conditions.