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Hydrothermal fabrication of well-ordered ZnO nanowire arrays on Zn foil: room temperature ultraviolet nanolasers

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Abstract

Well-ordered nanowires of the hexagonal wurtzite ZnO having an average diameter of 80 nm, a typical length of 12 μm, and a mean packing density of 7.5 nanowires μm−2 have been directly grown on Zn foil in a preferred [0001] direction by a hydrothermal process and employed for room temperature ultraviolet nanolasers. The lasing action of arrayed ZnO nanowires has been observed from 370 to 400 nm with threshold irradiance of 25 kW cm−2. Photoluminescence decays biexponentially: the fast component is attributed to free-exciton decay, and the slow one is to bound-exciton decay. The amplitude of the fast component increases whereas its lifetime decreases with the increment of threshold irradiance, suggesting that ZnO nanowire arrays undergo a change in the lasing mechanism from exciton–exciton scattering to electron–hole plasma recombination.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by research grants through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) (2011-0003074 and 2011-0001216). J.Y.K. acknowledges a BK21 scholarship as well.

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  1. School of Chemistry, Seoul National University, NS60, Seoul, 151-747, Republic of Korea

    Jong-Yeob Kim, Hyeok Jeong & Du-Jeon Jang

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  1. Jong-Yeob Kim
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  2. Hyeok Jeong
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Correspondence to Du-Jeon Jang.

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Kim, JY., Jeong, H. & Jang, DJ. Hydrothermal fabrication of well-ordered ZnO nanowire arrays on Zn foil: room temperature ultraviolet nanolasers. J Nanopart Res 13, 6699–6706 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11051-011-0576-8

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