Generating photoluminescent (PL) materials with high quantum yields and excellent stability has been a long-standing goal in the fields of materials and chemistry. However, it remains a challenging task to synthesize ultrasmall PL particles and visualize the underlying physical mechanism of synthesis. Here, we have reported the synthesis of spherical silica-CTAB hybrid nanoparticles (SCHNs) with a mean diameter of around 12 nm, which can exhibit a high PL quantum yield of up to 41.8% and long PL lifetime of up to ten microseconds under 365 nm e...
