Carbothermal synthesis of ZnO nanocomb structure

A study on the formation and characterization of ZnO nanocomb structure is presented. ZnO nanocomb was synthesized by the carbothermal reduction process with carbon black powder as a carbon source. As well as nanocomb, ZnO tetrapod and flower-like structures were also obtained in this experiment. When conventional graphite was used for a comparative study, no ZnO nanostructure could be achieved at the same experimental condition. The result shows that carbon source with large surface area more efficiently provides Zn(g) by the enhanced solid–solid reaction between C(s) and ZnO(s) source materials. The resulting ZnO structures were characterized with an X-ray diffractometer (XRD), a scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and a transmission electron microscopy (TEM), and the formation mechanism of nanocomb structure was discussed.