Growth of Electrodeposited ZnO Nanowires

Direct current electrodeposition method was used to deposit zinc oxide (ZnO) nanowire arrays from aqueous zinc chloride in ammonium chloride solution at 70 degrees C onto 10 mm x 10 mm anodic alumina oxide (AAO) templates. The AAO templates featured an average pore diameter of 80 nm. A 40 nm gold layer was sputtered onto the surface of the AAO templates before electrodeposition. ZnO nanowires were grown at a potential of (-)1V versus Ag/AgCl using DC potential amperometry. Characterization of ZnO nanowires was carried out for the as-deposited nanowire array. Atomic force microscopy was used to study the surface morphology. After deposition for 2.5 hours, the length of the nanowires was approximately 3.58 mu m on average. Scanning electron microscopy was used to view the cross-section of as-deposited ZnO nanowire array.