Scientists Confirm Purple Smoke in Fulminating Gold Comes From Nanoparticles of Gold

University of Bristol researchers recently discovered why fulminating gold produces purple smoke, answering a question that has puzzled experts for hundreds of years. Considered the first high explosive in the world, fulminating gold was initially synthesized as early as 1585 by Western alchemist Sebalt Schwartzer. More alchemists refined the compound through the 17th and 18th centuries, steadily shortening the production process and making it safer until modern scientists finally turned what had been a four-to-five day process into only a couple of minutes.

Fulminating gold is made from a mixture of chlorine, ammonia and gold. But unlike gunpowder, which was among the most common explosives at the time, it leaves a rich purple smoke when detonated. For more than 400 years, scientists have theorized about the source of this strange purple smoke, especially because other explosives do not produce purple smoke when detonated.

Chemists at the University of Bristol finally answered the question that plagued generations of scientists when they uncovered the reason for the purple smoke. The research team detonated samples of fulminating gold and used carbon-coated copper transmission electron microscope grids to capture and image the smoke for analysis. The researchers found that the smoke samples have clusters of spherical gold nanoparticles, validating a theory long held by many scientists.

While it hadn’t been proven, it was long theorized that the formation of gold nanoparticles after detonating fulminating gold was responsible for the rich purple color of the resultant smoke. Professor Simon Hall says that once the research team detonated 5 mg. samples of fulminating gold on aluminum foil, captured the resulting purple smoke via copper meshes, and used a transmission electron microscope (TEM) to analyze the smoke, they discovered the presence of spherical gold nanoparticles ranging from 30 to 300 nm.

The range in gold nanoparticle size indicates “extremely rapid synthesis,” the researchers noted. Furthermore, they called the lack of defined facets in the spherical gold nanoparticles “intriguing” and pointed to the accelerated synthesis of nanoparticles. Hall says he is delighted the research team finally provided an answer to a centuries-long question and helped further the scientific community’s understanding of fulminating gold.

PhD student Jan Maurycy-Uszko, Hall and other members of the research team plan on using the methodology they used to determine the presence of spherical gold nanoparticles in fulminating gold detonation smoke to precisely analyze the nature of other clouds produced from metal fulminates, including lead, mercury and platinum.

The findings of this research provide more insights into an ancient metal that has been extracted for millennia, and in modern times by enterprises such as Royal Gold Inc. (NASDAQ: RGLD).

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