Magnetic nanoparticles have a significant impact on the development of basic sciences and nanomedical, electronic, optical, and biotech industries. The development of magnetic structures with size homogeneity, magnetization, and particle dispersibility due to high-quality process development can broaden their utilization for separation analysis, structural color optics using surface modification, and energy/catalysts. In addition, magnetic nanoparticles simultaneously exhibit two properties: magnetic and plasmon resonance, which can be self-assembled and can improve signal sensitivity through plasmon resonance. This paper reports typical examples of the synthesis and properties of various magnetic nanoparticles, especially magnetoplasmonic nanoparticles developed in our laboratory over the past decade, and their optical, electrochemical, energy/catalytic, and bio-applications. In addition, the future value of magnetoplasmonic nanoparticles can be reevaluated by comparing them with that reported in the literature.

We report on a simple and robust route to the spontaneous assembly of well-ordered magnetic nanoparticle superstructures by irreversible evaporation of a sessile single droplet of a mixture of a ferrofluid (FF) and a nonmagnetic fluid (NF). The resulting assembled superstructures are seen to form well-packed, vertically arranged columns with diameters of 5~0.7 μm, interparticle spacings of 9~2 μm, and heights of 1.3~3 μm. The assembled superstructures are strongly dependent on both the magnitude of magnetic field and the mixing ratio of the mixture. As the magnitude of the externally applied magnetic field and the mixing ratio of the mixture increase gradually, the size and interspacing of the magnetic nanoparticle aggregations decrease. Without an externally applied magnetic field, featureless patterns are observed for the γ-Fe₃O₄ nanoparticle aggregations. The proposed approach may lead to a versatile, cost-effective, fast, and scalable fabrication process based on the field-induced self-assembly of magnetic nanoparticles.