One-Step Microwaving Method to Synthesize Graphene-CdS Nanocomposite

Graphene-CdS nanocomposite is a very promising optoelectronic material, and its optoelectronic properties are critically dependent on the distribution of CdS nanoparticles (NPs) on single sheets of graphene. Herein, we developed a facile one-step one-pot microwaving method to produce graphene-CdS nanocomposite, only involving of a few minutes' microwaving of the mixture of graphene oxide (GO), dihydrate acid cadmium and thioacetamide in 90% ethylene glycol solvent. The whole process is simple, efficient and environmental friendly. This method is an improvement of our previous dimethyl sulfoxide method (Adv.. Mater., 2010,22:103-106). Using stoichiometric thioacetamide as the sulfur source, the current method avoided the byproduct of hazard hydrogen sulfide gas of the previous method. While using GO as the initial material, which was simultaneously reduced during the microwaving process as CdS NPs grew on graphene sheet, guaranteed that graphene was mainly single-layer sheets in the final nanocomposite. TEM and XRD results show that well-crystallized CdS NPs of a blende structure with an average diameter of about 5.7 nm nicely distributed on single graphene sheets with almost no aggregation.