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Cathodoluminescence characterization of ZnO nanorods synthesized by chemical solution and of its conversion to ellipsoidal morphology

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Abstract

A facile and reproducible low-temperature (80 °C) solution route has been introduced to synthesize ZnO ellipsoids on silicon substrate without any pretreatment of the substrate or organic/inorganic additives. Scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, and x-ray diffraction spectroscopy are performed to analyze the structural evolution, the single crystalline nature, and growth orientation at different stages of the synthetic process. The sequential formation mechanisms of heterogeneous nucleation in primary and secondary crystal growth behaviors have been discussed in detail. The presented results reveal that the morphology of micro/nanostructures with desired features can be optimized. The optical properties of grown structures at different stages were investigated using cathodoluminescence (CL). The monochromatic CL images were recorded to examine the UV and visible band emission contributions from the different positions of the intermediate and final structures of the individual ZnO ellipsoid. Significant enhancement in the defect level emission intensity at the central position of the structure reveals that the quality of the material improves as the reaction time is extended.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We are humbly grateful to Prof. Le Si Dang from the Institut Néel-CNRS, Grenoble, France, for his help regarding cathodoluminescence measurements. The authors also acknowledge the financial support from the Higher Education Commission (HEC), Pakistan.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Science and Technology, Linköping University, Norrköping, SE-60174, Sweden

    Muhammad Israr-Qadir, Sadaf Jamil-Rana, Omer Nur & Magnus Willander

  2. Materials Engineering Department, School of Chemical and Materials Engineering, National University of Science and Technology, Islamabad, 44000, Pakistan

    Muhammad Israr-Qadir

  3. Department of Physics, Chemistry and Biology, Linköping University, Linköping, SE-58183, Sweden

    Jun Lu & Lars Hultman

Authors
  1. Muhammad Israr-Qadir
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  2. Sadaf Jamil-Rana
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  5. Jun Lu
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Correspondence to Muhammad Israr-Qadir or Sadaf Jamil-Rana.

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Israr-Qadir, M., Jamil-Rana, S., Nur, O. et al. Cathodoluminescence characterization of ZnO nanorods synthesized by chemical solution and of its conversion to ellipsoidal morphology. Journal of Materials Research 29, 2425–2431 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1557/jmr.2014.242

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