Hydrothermal synthesis of oriented ZnO nanobelts and their temperature dependent photoluminescence

Oriented single crystalline ZnO nanobelts have been synthesized through a hydrothermal method. Structural characterizations using X-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy revealed that the ZnO nanobelts possess wurtzite structure with a c-axis growth orientation and are faceted in (1 1 2 0) and (0 1 1 0) atomic planes. The growth mechanism of the nanobelts was discussed. Temperature-dependent photoluminescence measurement of the annealed ZnO nanobelts has been carried out and it showed that both the excitonic emission and the deep level emissions increased with decreasing temperature.