Controllable Growth of Highly Ordered ZnO Nanorod Arrays via Inverted Self-Assembled Monolayer Template

• Published in: ACS applied materials & interfaces Vol. 3; no. 11; pp. 4388 - 4395
• Main Authors: Dong, J. J, Zhang, X. W, Yin, Z. G, Zhang, S. G, Wang, J. X, Tan, H. R, Gao, Y, Si, F. T, Gao, H. L
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States American Chemical Society 23.11.2011
• Subjects: Zinc oxide nanorods; Inverted self-assembled monolayer; Reactive ion etching; Hydrothermal synthesis; Epitaxial growth
• ISSN: 1944-8244; 1944-8252
• DOI: 10.1021/am2010288

This article presents a facile and effective approach to the controllable growth of highly ordered and vertically aligned ZnO nanorod arrays on the GaN substrate via a hydrothermal route by using the TiO2 ring template deriving from the polystyrene microsphere self-assembled monolayer. The size of TiO2 ring template can be flexibly tuned from 50 to 400 nm for the 500 nm polystyrene microspheres by varying the time of reactive ion etching and the concentration of TiO2 sol. As a result, the diameter of the individual ZnO nanorods can be potentially tuned over a wide range. The combination of several characterization techniques has demonstrated that the ordered ZnO nanorods are highly uniform in diameter and height with perfect alignment and are epitaxially grown along [0001] direction. This work provides a novel and accessible route to prepare oriented and aligned ZnO nanorod arrays with high crystalline quality.