Increase of nanodiamond crystal size by selective oxidation

• Published in: Diamond and related materials Vol. 17; no. 7; pp. 1122 - 1126
• Main Authors: Osswald, S., Havel, M., Mochalin, V., Yushin, G., Gogotsi, Y.
• Format: Journal Article Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: Amsterdam Elsevier B.V 01.07.2008; Elsevier
• Subjects: Composition and phase identification; Condensed matter: structure, mechanical and thermal properties; Cross-disciplinary physics: materials science; rheology; Exact sciences and technology; Fullerenes and related materials; diamonds, graphite; High resolution electron microscopy; Materials science; Nanocrystalline diamond; Nanocrystalline materials; Nanoscale materials and structures: fabrication and characterization; Oxidation; Physics; Raman spectroscopy; Specific materials; Structure and morphology; thickness; Surfaces and interfaces; thin films and whiskers (structure and nonelectronic properties); Thin film structure and morphology; X-ray diffraction; X-ray diffraction; High resolution electron microscopy; Oxidation; Nanocrystalline diamond; Raman spectroscopy; X-ray microscopy; Synthetic diamond; Size measurement; XRD; Physical properties; Polycrystalline diamond; Ultrananocrystalline diamond; Transmission electron microscopy; Nanopowder; Chemical properties; Nanostructured materials
• ISSN: 0925-9635; 1879-0062
• DOI: 10.1016/j.diamond.2008.01.102

The control of the crystal size in nanodiamond (ND) powder is crucial, since most of its physical and chemical properties are size-related. In this work we demonstrate a simple method for increasing the crystal size of ND powder by selective oxidation in air. We analyze the oxidized powders by high-resolution transmission electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction and Raman spectroscopy in order to monitor changes in the average crystal size distribution and identify the limitations of these techniques for crystal size measurements. Our studies show that none of these techniques alone is able to provide sufficiently accurate information on size distributions, but can produce complementary results for better understanding of the properties of ND powder.