• Advances in nano research
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.43-58
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• 2013

Zinc oxide (ZnO) is a unique semiconductor material that exhibits numerous useful properties for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) and other applications. Various thin-film growth techniques have been used to produce nanowires, nanorods, nanotubes, nanotips, nanosheets, nanobelts and terapods of ZnO. These unique nanostructures unambiguously demonstrate that ZnO probably has the richest family of nanostructures among all materials, both in structures and in properties. The nanostructures could have novel applications in solar cells, optoelectronics, sensors, transducers and biomedical sciences. This article reviews the various nanostructures of ZnO grown by various techniques and their application in DSSCs. The application of ZnO nanowires, nanorods in DSSCs became outstanding, providing a direct pathway to the anode for photo-generated electrons thereby suppressing carrier recombination. This is a novel characteristic which increases the efficiency of ZnO based dye-sensitized solar cells.

• Journal of the Korean Electrochemical Society
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.161-171
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• 2015

High-yield zinc germanium oxide ($Zn_2GeO_4$) and zinc tin oxide ($Zn_2SnO_4$) nanowires were synthesized using a hydrothermal method. We investigated the electrochemical properties of these $Zn_2GeO_4$ and $Zn_2SnO_4$ nanowires as anode materials of lithium ion battery and sodium ion battery. The $Zn_2GeO_4$ and $Zn_2SnO_4$ nanowires showed excellent cycling performance of the lithium ion battery, with a maximum capacity of 1021 mAh/g and 692 mAh/g after 50 cycles, respectively, with a high Coulomb efficiency of 98 %. For the first time, we examined the cycling performance of $Zn_2GeO_4$ and $Zn_2SnO_4$ nanowires for sodium ion batteries. The maximum capacity is 168 mAh/g and 200 mAh/g after 50 cycles, respectively, with a high Coulomb efficiency of 97%. These nanowires are expected as promising electrode materials for the development of high-performance lithium ion batteries as well as sodium ion batteries.

• Transactions of the Society of Information Storage Systems
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.43-46
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• 2007

The fabrication of metal nanostructures by a combination of atomic force microscopy nanomachining on a thin polymer resist, metal coating and lift-off is reported. Nanodots with sizes and nanowires with widths ranging between 50 and 100 nm have been successfully created. The present work exemplifies the feasibility and effectiveness of using a single-layer resist in comparison with a two-layer resist. In addition, the localized surface plasmon resonance peaks of the metal nanostructures have been measured and the selective growths of zinc oxide nanowires on the metal nanostructures are demonstrated.

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2009.11a
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• pp.5.2-5.2
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• 2009

From 10 years ago, the development of nano-devices endeavored to achieve reconstruction of information technology (IT) and nano technology (NT) industry. Among the many materials for the IT and NT industry, zinc oxide (ZnO) is a very promising candidate material for the research of nano-device development. Nano-structures of ZnO-based materials were grown easily via various methods and it attracts huge attention because of their superior electrical and optical properties for optoelectronic devices. Recently, among the various growth methods, MOCVD has attracted considerable attention because it is suitable process with benefits such as large area growth, vertical alignment, and accurate doping for nano-device fabrication. However, ZnO based nanowires grown by MOCVD process were had the principal problems of 1st interfacial layers between substrate and nanowire, 2nd a broad diameter (about 100 nm), and 3rd high density, and 4th critical evaporation temperature of Zinc precursors. In particular, the growth of high performance nanowire for high efficiency nano-devices must be formed at high temperature growth, but zinc precursors were evaporated at high temperature.These problems should be repaired for materialization of ultra high performance quantum devices with quantum effect. For this reason, we firstly proposed the growth method of vertical aligned slim MgZnO nanowires (< 10 nm) without interfacial layers using self-phase separation by introduced Mg at critical evaporation temperature of Zinc precursors ($500^{\circ}C$). Here, the self-phase separation was reported that MgO-rich and the ZnO-rich phases were spontaneously formed by additionally introduced Mg precursors. In the growth of nanowires, the nanowires were only grown on the wurzite single crystal seeds as ZnO-rich phases with relatively low Mg composition (~36 at %). In this study, we investigated the microstructural behaviors of self-phase separation with increasing the Mg fluxes in the growth of MZO NWs, in order to secure drastic control engineering of density,diameter, and shape of nanowires.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.18 no.12
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• pp.669-672
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• 2008

Well-aligned Zinc oxide (ZnO) nanowires were synthesized on silicon substrates by a carbothermal evaporation method using a mixture of ZnO and graphite powder with Au thin film was used as a catalyst. The XRD results showed that as-prepared product is the hexagonal wurzite ZnO nanostructure and SEM images demonstrated that ZnO nanowires had been grown along the [0001] direction with hexagonal cross section. As-grown ZnO nanowires were coated with glucose oxidase (GOx) for glucose sensing. Glucose converted into gluconic acid by reaction with GOx and two electrons are generated. They transfer into ZnO nanowires due to the electric force between electrons and the positively charged ZnO nanostructures in PBS. Photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy was employed for investigating the movements of electrons, and the peak PL intensity increased with the glucose concentration and became saturated when the glucose concentration is above 10 mM. These results demonstrate that ZnO nanostructures have potential applications in biosensors.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.47 no.3
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• pp.577-592
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• 2023

In this study, nanofiber-based textile sensors were developed for motion detection and monitoring. Poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF) nanofibers containing zinc oxide (ZnO) nanoparticles and silver nanowires (AgNW) were fabricated using electrospinning. PVDF was chosen as a piezoelectric polymer, zinc oxide as a piezoelectric ceramic, and AgNW as a metal to improve electric conductivity. The PVDF/ZnO/AgNW nanocomposite fibers were used to develop a textile sensor, which was then incorporated into an elbow band to develop a wearable smart band. Changes in the output voltage and peak-to-peak voltage (V_p-p) generated by the joint's flexion and extension were investigated using a dummy elbow. The β-phase crystallinity of pure PVDF nanofibers was 58% when analyzed using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy; however, the β-phase crystallinity increased to 70% in PVDF nanofibers containing ZnO and to 78% in PVDF nanocomposite fibers containing both ZnO and AgNW. The textile sensor's output voltage values varied with joint-bending angle; upon increasing the joint angle from 45° to 90° to 150°, the V_p-p value increased from 0.321 V_p-p to 0.542 V_p-p to 0.660 V_p-p respectively. This suggests that the textile sensor can be used to detect and monitor body movements.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.61 no.4
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• pp.590-594
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• 2012

ZnO nanowires were fabricated by hydrothermal synthesis technique for field emission device application. Al-doped zinc oxide (AZO) thin films were prepared as seed layer of catalyst for the ZnO nanowire synthesis, for which conductivity of the seed layer was tried to be improved for enhancing the field emission property of the ZnO nanowire. The AZO seed layer revealed specific resistivity of $ 7.466{\times}10^{-4}[{\Omega}{\cdot}cm]$ and carrier mobility of 18.6[$cm^2$/Vs]. Additionally, upper tip of the prepared ZnO nanowires was treated by hydrochloric acid (HCl) to form a nanocone shape of ZnO nanowire, which was aimed for enhanced focusing of electric field on that and resultingly to improve field emission property of the ZnO nanowires. The ZnO nanowire with nanocone shape revealed decreased threshold electric field and increased current density than those of the simple ZnO nanowires.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.21 no.8
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• pp.766-769
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• 2008

Zinc oxide (ZnO) nanowires were prepared on Si substrates by a thermal evaporation method at different temperatures and $O_2$ pressure. Microstructural analysis of the obtained ZnO nanowires was performed by using transmission electron microscopy(TEM) and scanning electron microscopy(SEM). Phase analysis was done using X-ray diffraction(XRD). As the deposition temperature and oxygen pressure were increased, the diameter and length of ZnO nanowires had a tendency to increase. Based on TEM and XRD analyses, the nanowires are single crystalline in nature and consist of a single phase. According to the measurements, the ZnO nanowires grown at 1100$^{\circ}C$, Ar 50 sccm, $O_2$ 10 sccm have good properties.

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2010.05a
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• pp.27.2-27.2
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• 2010

In recent years, there is a strong requirement of low cost, stable microelectro mechanical systems (MEMS) for resonators, microswitches and sensors. Most of these devices consist of freely suspended microcantilevers, which are usually made by the etching of some sacrificial materials. Herein, we have attempted to use Si nanowires, inherited from the parent Si wafer, as a sacrificial material due to its porosity, low cost and ease of fabrication. Prior to the fabrication of the Si nanowires silver nanoparticles were continuously formed on the surface of Si wafer. Vertically aligned Si nanowires were fabricated from the parent Si wafers by aqueous chemical route at $50^{\circ}C$. Afterwards, the morphological and structural characteristics of the Si nanowires were investigated. The morphology of nanowires was strongly modulated by the resistivity of the parent wafer. The 3-step etching of nanowires in diluted KOH solution was carried out at room temperature in order to control the fast etching. A layer of $Si_3N_4$ (300 nm) was used for the selective fabrication of nanowires. Finally, a freely suspended bridge of zinc oxide (ZnO) was fabricated after the removal of nanowires from the parent wafer. At present, we believe that this technique may provide a platform for the inexpensive fabrication of futuristic MEMS.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2013.08a
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• pp.252.2-252.2
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• 2013

ZnO nanostructures have a lot of interest for decades due to its varied applications such as light-emitting devices, power generators, solar cells, and sensing devices etc. To get the high performance of these devices, the factors of nanostructure geometry, spacing, and alignment are important. So, Patterning of vertically- aligned ZnO nanowires are currently attractive. However, many of ZnO nanowire or nanorod fabrication methods are needs high temperature, such vapor phase transport process, metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD), metal-organic vapor phase epitaxy, thermal evaporation, pulse laser deposition and thermal chemical vapor deposition. While hydrothermal process has great advantages-low temperature (less than $100^{\circ}C$), simple steps, short time consuming, without catalyst, and relatively ease to control than as mentioned various methods. In this work, we investigate the dependence of ZnO nanowire alignment and morphology on si substrate using of nanosphere template with various precursor concentration and components via hydrothermal process. The brief experimental scheme is as follow. First synthesized ZnO seed solution was spun coated on to cleaned Si substrate, and then annealed $350^{\circ}C$ for 1h in the furnace. Second, 200nm sized close-packed nanospheres were formed on the seed layer-coated substrate by using of gas-liquid-solid interfacial self-assembly method and drying in vaccum desicator for about a day to enhance the adhesion between seed layer and nanospheres. After that, zinc oxide nanowires were synthesized using a low temperature hydrothermal method based on alkali solution. The specimens were immersed upside down in the autoclave bath to prevent some precipitates which formed and covered on the surface. The hydrothermal conditions such as growth temperature, growth time, solution concentration, and additives are variously performed to optimize the morphologies of nanowire. To characterize the crystal structure of seed layer and nanowires, morphology, and optical properties, X-ray diffraction (XRD), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), Raman spectroscopy, and photoluminescence (PL) studies were investigated.