Hydrothermal synthesis of SnO2 nanocubes and nanospheres and their gas sensing properties

Abstract

In this work, we reported successful synthesis of SnO2 nanocubes and nanospheres via a facile hydrothermal technique. The as-obtained SnO2 nanostructures have been characterized by X-ray diffraction and field-emission scanning electron microscopy. The formation mechanism of aforementioned SnO2 nanostructures has been proposed in detail, especially SnO2 nanaocubes, which has been systematically investigated by varying the reaction time and the surfactant SDS play a key role in growth process of nanocubes. Furthermore, the gas sensing properties of as-prepared SnO2 nanostructures have been tested towards ethanol. Interestingly, it is noted that gas sensing performance of nanocubes are superior to nanospheres, which certified that the gas sensing properties can be enhanced by controlling the morphologies and the SnO2 nanocubes maybe a promising candidate based materials in the fields of gas sensors.