Growth of silicon carbide nanorods from the hybrid of lignin and polysiloxane using sol-gel process and polymer blend technique

Abstract

We report here the formation of silicon carbide (SiC) nanorods from organic–inorganic hybrid of the commercially available lignin and sol-gel derived nanosized silica. The SiC nanorods were identified by using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The surface morphology shows the formation of continuous nanorods of diameter in the range of 50–200 nm. The X-ray diffraction (XRD) pattern show peaks at 2 θ = 35.5° and 60.2° indicate the formation of β-SiC and a sharp peak at 2 θ = 22.1° suggests the presence of unreacted crystalline silica (crystoballite). The characteristic vibration of SiC at 791 cm − 1 in Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) was also observed.