• Korean Journal of Metals and Materials
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• v.48 no.9
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• pp.861-866
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• 2010

Tetrapod-shaped ZnO crystals were synthesized through a simple oxidation of metallic Zn powder in air without the presence of any catalysts or substrates. X-ray diffraction data revealed that the ZnO crystals had wurtzite structure. It is supposed that the growth of the tetrapod proceeded in a vapor-solid growth mechanism. As the amount of the source powder increased, the size of the tetrapod decreased. The tip morphology of the tetrapod changed from a needle-like shape to a spherical shape with the oxidation time. ZnO crystals with rod shape were fabricated via the oxidation of Zn and Sn mixture. Sn played an important role in the formation of ZnO crystals with different morphology by affecting the growth mode of ZnO crystals. The cathodoluminescent properties were measured for the samples. The strongest green emission was observed for the rod-shaped ZnO crystals, suggesting that the crystals had the high density of oxygen vacancies.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.256-260
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• 2011

ZnO nanostructures with tetrapod, needle and multipod shapes were synthesized without catalysts through a simple thermal oxidation of metallic Zn powder in alumina crucible under air atmosphere. X-ray diffraction data revealed that the ZnO nanostructures had wurtzite structure of hexagonal phase. Energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) spectra showed that the ZnO was of high purity. After the oxidation of Zn powder, white colored product was mainly observed and yellow colored product was observed only a very little on the surface of the oxidized source materials. The white product consisted of tetrapods, while yellow product was composed of needles and multipods. Cathodoluminescece spectra showed that the crystalline quality of tetrapods was better that those of needles and multipods.

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2007.11a
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• pp.141.1-141.1
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• 2007

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.28 no.10
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• pp.578-582
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• 2018

ZnO crystals with different morphologies are synthesized through thermal evaporation of the mixture of Zn and Cu powder in air at atmospheric pressure. ZnO crystals with wire shape are synthesized when the process is performed at $1,000^{\circ}C$, while tetrapod-shaped ZnO crystals begin to form at $1,100^{\circ}C$. The wire-shaped ZnO crystals form even at $1,000^{\circ}C$, indicating that Cu acts as a reducing agent. As the temperature increases to $1,200^{\circ}C$, a large quantity of tetrapod-shaped ZnO crystals form and their size also increases. In addition to the tetrapods, rod-shaped ZnO crystals are observed. The atomic ratio of Zn and O in the ZnO crystals is approximately 1:1 with an increasing process temperature from $1,000^{\circ}C$ to $1,200^{\circ}C$. For the ZnO crystals synthesized at $1,000^{\circ}C$, no luminescence spectrum is observed. A weak visible luminescence is detected for the ZnO crystals prepared at $1,100^{\circ}C$. Ultraviolet and visible luminescence peaks with strong intensities are observed in the luminescence spectrum of the ZnO crystals formed at $1,200^{\circ}C$.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.25 no.11
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• pp.873-877
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• 2012

The effect of oxygen pressure in the synthesis of ZnO nanostructures through thermal evaporation of Zn powder was investigated. The thermal evaporation process was carried out in oxygen ambient for 1 hr at $1,000^{\circ}C$ under different pressures. The oxygen pressure was changed in range of 0.5 ~ 900 Torr. Any nanostructure was not formed on the specimens prepared at oxygen pressures lower than 10 Torr. When oxygen pressure was 100 Torr, ZnO nanowires were observed. With increasing the oxygen pressure to 500 Torr, the morphology of ZnO nanostructures changed from wire to tetrapod. For all the samples, room temperature photoluminescence spectra show a strong green emission peak at around 550 nm.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Information and Commucation Sciences Conference
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.1013-1016
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• 2005

ZnO nanostructure was fabricated by catalyst-free method using Zn powder in air. The growth temperature was controlled from 450$^{\circ}$C to 600$^{\circ}$C, and the structural and optical properties were investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), photoluminescence (PL), energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) and cathodoluminescence (CL). From all samples both ZnO tetrapods and clusters were observed. No significant dispersion was observed from the ZnO tetrapods, however, ZnO clusters show considerable change in density and size. From the EDX results, atomic composition difference was found. The clusters have O-deficiencies, while tetrapods have stoichiometric composition. Strong luminescence was observed at room temperature. From room temperature PL, UV emission at 380 nm and green emission at 500 nm were observed, and the intensity ratio ($I_{uv}/I_{green}$) increased as growth temperature increases. CL measurements show that the UV emission is closely related with tetrapods and the green emission is dominated from the clusters.

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.54 no.6
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• pp.340-347
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• 2021

Among various metal oxide semiconductors, ZnO has an excellent electrical, optical properties with a wide bandgap of 3.3 eV. It can be applied as a photocatalytic material due to its high absorption rate along with physical and chemical stability to UV light. In addition, it is important to control the morphology of ZnO because the size and shape of the ZnO make difference in physical properties. In this paper, we demonstrate synthesis of size-controlled ZnO tetrapods using an atmospheric pressure plasma system. A micro-sized Zn spherical powder was continuously introduced in the plume of the atmospheric plasma jet ignited with mixture of oxygen and nitrogen. The effect of plasma power and collection sites on ZnO nanostructure was investigated. After the plasma discharge for 10 min, the produced materials deposited inside the 60-cm-long quartz tube were obtained with respect to the distance from the plume. According to the SEM analysis, all the synthesized nanoparticles were found to be ZnO tetrapods ranging from 100 to 600-nm-diameter depending on both applied power and collection site. The photocatalytic efficiency was evaluated by color change of methylene blue solution using UV-Vis spectroscopy. The photocatalytic activity increased with the increase of (101) and (100) plane in ZnO tetrapods, which is caused by enhanced chemical effects of plasma process.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.21 no.11
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• pp.995-999
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• 2008

ZnO nanowires with tetrapod shape were formed on the surface of the sample by direct melt oxidation of Al-Zn alloy at $1000^{\circ}C$ in air. X-ray diffraction (XRD) pattern revealed that the ZnO nanowires had wurtzite structure of hexagonal phase. Any other element except Zn and O was not detected in energy dispersive X-ray spectrum. The c- and a-axis lattice constants estimated from the XRD pattern were 0.520 and 0.325 nm, respectively. These are in well accordance with those of bulk ZnO single crystal, indicating high quality crystallinity. The green light emission at a wavelength of 510 nm was observed from the nanowires at room temperature, which was ascribed to high density of oxygen vacancies in nanowires.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.27 no.7
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• pp.443-447
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• 2014

ZnO crystals with different morphologies were synthesized through a thermal evaporation of Zn-Mn mixtures in air. The morphology was dependant on the Mn content in Zn-Mn mixture. The morphology was changed from rod to tetrapod shape with decreasing Mn content in Zn-Mn mixture. The result indicates that the concentration of Mn might be responsible for the different morphologies of ZnO crystals. XRD spectra showed that the ZnO crystals had a hexagonal wurtzite crystal strutures. For all the samples, room temperature cathodoluminescence spectra showed a ultra-violet emission at 380 nm and a green emission at around 500 nm. However, the intensity ratio of ultra-violet emission to green emission was significantly different with the Mn content in the source material.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.25 no.6
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• pp.265-268
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• 2015

ZnO micro/nanocrystals at large scale were synthesized through the thermal evaporation of Al-Zn mixtures under air atmosphere. The effect of synthetic temperature and time on the morphology of the micro/nanocrystals was examined. It was found that the temperature and time affected the morphology of the ZnO crystals. At temperatures below $900^{\circ}C$, no crystals were synthesized. At a temperature of $1000^{\circ}C$, ZnO crystals with a rod shape were synthesized. With an increase in temperature from $1000^{\circ}C$ to $1100^{\circ}C$, the morphology of the crystals changed from rod shape to wire and granular shapes. As the time increased from 2 h to 3 h at $1000^{\circ}C$, tetrapod-shaped ZnO crystals started to form. XRD patterns showed that the ZnO crystals had a hexagonal wurtzite structure. EDX analysis revealed that the ZnO crystals had high purity. It is believed that the ZnO nanowires were grown via a vapor-solid mechanism because no catalyst particles were observed at the tips of the micro/nanocrystals in the SEM images.