ZnO Nanoplates: Hydrothermal Synthesis, Physico-Chemical Characterization and Optical Properties Study

Nano-ZnO plate-like morphology was successfully prepared via simple hydrothermal treatment by using zinc acetate as a zinc source and hexamethylenetetramine (HMTA) as structuring agent. Chemical composition, structural, morphological and optical properties of the as-prepared ZnO nanoplates were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), UV-vis spectroscopy and photoluminescence (PL). This study shows that the band gap of the ZnO nanoplates can be estimated to be 3.41 eV. The photoluminescence spectrum of nano-ZnO plates has identified several kinds of defects such as oxygen vacancy (VO), zinc vacancy (VZn) and interstitial zinc (Zni). To further understand the influence of hexamethylenetetramine in the formation processes of the nano-ZnO, we propose apossible growthmechanism to describe the different steps.