Synthesis and characterization of ZnO nanorods with a narrow size distribution

Abstract

The development of novel materials for energy harvesting applications or strain sensing has generated great interest towards zinc oxide (ZnO) nanostructures, and in particular towards the synthesis of ZnO nanowires or nanorods with well controlled morphology and properties. The high-yield mass production of such nanostructures by catalyst-free methods is a crucial aspect to enable a cost-effective large-scale development of new ZnO-based piezoelectric devices and materials. In the present work, we propose a method for the mass-production of high-purity ZnO-nanorods with a uniform size distribution, based on the combination of thermal decomposition of zinc acetate dihydrate and probe sonication in acetone. The quality of the produced ZnO nanorods is assessed through multi-technique characterization using field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), and photo-luminescence spectroscopy (PL). The adopted synthesis method is simple, cost effective and feasible for large-scale production. Various process parameters such as precursor amount and growth time have been found to play an important role in controlling the formation of the as grown nanostructures with high uniformity in size and morphology. Size distribution curves were employed to depict the effect of various process parameters for tailoring the morphology, homogeneity and aspect ratio of the nanorods. Our results reveal that the high crystallographic quality of ZnO nanorods grown by a long-time thermal decomposition method is not affected by probe sonication, which is proposed as a post-synthesis step necessary to produce ZnO nanorod powder with a uniform distribution of diameters and lengths

Zinc Oxide Nanorods-Decorated Graphene Nanoplatelets: A Promising Antimicrobial Agent against the Cariogenic Bacterium Streptococcus mutans

“…Pristine ZnO-NRs were produced through the thermal decomposition of zinc acetate di-hydrate and successive probe sonication as described in our earlier works [32,34]. ZNGs were produced by directly growing ZnO-NRs onto unsupported GNPs in aqueous suspensions through a facile hydrothermal method [35].…”

“…Several methods have been developed to synthesize ZnO materials as one-dimensional (1D) nanostructures with different morphologies including nanowires, nanorods, nanoneedles, and nanorings [24,25,26,27,28]. Synthesis of ZnO nanorods (ZnO-NRs) via chemical approaches opens the route to low-cost catalyst-free mass-production of ZnO nanostructures [29,30,31,32]. In our previous studies, through both in vitro and in vivo systems, we have demonstrated the very low cytotoxicity of ZnO-NRs [33], together with their great potential as antibacterial material acting as nano-needles against Staphylococcus aureus and Bacillus subtilis [34].…”

Control of the size and density of ZnO-nanorods grown onto graphene nanoplatelets in aqueous suspensions

“…However, synthesis of ZnOnanostructures (i.e. c-axis oriented nanowires or a-axis oriented nanobelts 17 ) is very sensitive to the growth conditions [18][19][20] and, consequently, special care must be paid in order to assure reproducibility and controllability. Recently, interesting progresses have been made towards the fabrication of ZnO-graphene hybrid nanostructures by using different techniques, such as: chemical vapor deposition (CVD) of ZnO nanostructures on CVD-grown graphene; synthesis in liquid solution of ZnO-NRs onto graphene akes transferred via scotch-tape; synthesis in liquid solution of ZnO-NRs on CVDgrown graphene; synthesis in liquid solution of ZnO-NRs onto chemically-reduced graphene oxide (RGO).…”

Antibacterial Effect of Zinc Oxide-Based Nanomaterials on Environmental Biodeteriogens Affecting Historical Buildings

“…Zinc oxide nanorods (ZnO-NRs) were synthesized through thermal decomposition of zinc acetate di-hydrate and successive probe sonication as described in [29]. Their morphology was observed through high-resolution field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM).…”