Mechanism of Generation of ZnO Microstructures by Microwave-Assisted Hydrothermal Approach

Ravish Majithia; Jeffrey Speich; Kenith E Meissner

doi:10.3390/ma6062497

Mechanism of Generation of ZnO Microstructures by Microwave-Assisted Hydrothermal Approach

Materials (Basel). 2013 Jun 18;6(6):2497-2507. doi: 10.3390/ma6062497.

Authors

Ravish Majithia¹, Jeffrey Speich², Kenith E Meissner^{3

2}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843, USA. ravishmajithia@tamu.edu.
² Department of Biomedical Engineering, 5045 ETB, Texas A&M University, TX 77843, USA. kmeissner@tamu.edu.
³ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843, USA. kmeissner@tamu.edu.

Abstract

In this report, a technique for rapid synthesis of ZnO microstructures by microwave-assisted heating of precursors at hydrothermal conditions is demonstrated. Further, the reaction mechanism for the growth of ZnO microstructures is analyzed. An accelerated rate of reaction obtained using microwaves enables a dissolution-recrystallization mechanism for generation of one dimensional (1D) rod-like structures, thereby showing that time of reaction can be used to dictate ZnO microstructure morphology.

Keywords: hemimorphite; hydrothermal; microwave-assisted; zinc oxide.