Self-organized growth of particular ZnO nanocrystalline in the presence of steam

Abstract

In this paper, different kinds of ZnO round clusters have been synthesized on silicon substrate in the presence of steam which was used as oxidant at a low temperature of about 300 °C. The intrinsic characteristics of as-deposited nanostructured ZnO were studied using x-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM,) equipped with energy-dispersive x-ray spectroscopy (EDS) and photoluminescence (PL). The SEM results reveal that these nanocrystals can be self-assembled into very interesting patterns, such as micro-rounds, micro-citys etc. X-ray diffraction demonstrates that the as deposited ZnO can be indexed to wurtzite structured with high purity. The photoluminescence spectra shows that these particular nanostructured ZnO have weak band at ∼508 nm which is due to oxygen deficiency. ZnO-CNTs nanocomposite has remarkable properties and versatile applications. Herein, ZnO nanocrystals have been deposited on CNTs directly for the purpose of obtaining ZnO-CNTs nanocomposites, and interestingly, some nanostructured composites have been achieved by this method. This approach opens a new way to synthesize semiconductor oxides and their compounds by selective oxidation. These deposited nanomaterials may have potential applications in sensors, generators, catalysis etc.