Low temperature aqueous chemical growth, structural, and optical properties of Mn-doped ZnO nanowires

Abstract

Mn-doped ZnO nanowires were successfully synthesized by using the low temperature aqueous chemical growth (ACG) method. Field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), energy dispersive X-ray (EDX), X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-Ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), and photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy have been used to characterize the grown Zn1−xMnxO. The FESEM and the XRD measurements revealed that the grown of Mn-doped ZnO had wurtzite structure and the lattice parameters and the size of the crystal changed according to the change of concentration of the dopant. The chemical composition and charge states of the Mn ions doped in the ZnO nanowires was analyzed by the EDX and the XPS, respectively, indicated that the Mn ions is incorporated onto zinc sites in the ZnO nanowires. PL spectroscoCpy shows a strong ultraviolet (UV) emission peak at 378nm (3.27eV) from the Mn-doped ZnO nanowires, which is shifted 6nm to the lower wavelength compared to ZnO nanowires grown by the same ACG method. The unique feature of our samples were the simple low temperature growth method which provides no clustering and the as-synthesized Mn-doped ZnO nanowires have shown good crystal quality. This capability to fabricate Mn-doped ZnO nanowires is of potential to develop new spintronic, photonic and sensor devices fabrication on any substrates.