Fabrication of ZnO with tunable morphology through a facile treatment of Zn-based coordination polymers

The morphology and structure of zinc oxide (ZnO), one of the important semiconductors, are relevant to its properties and applications. The preparation of ZnO with tunable morphology and desired structure is an attractive topic in the field of material synthesis. This work reports a facile method for the synthesis of ZnO with controllable morphology and crystal orientation using Zn-based coordination polymer particles (Zn-CPP) as precursors. Using hydrothermal method, Zn-CPP with morphologies of microrod, nanoplate, flower-like, arrow-tipped microsheet, and square cylinder were successfully synthesized via the coordination between metal ions Zn2+ and organic ligand 1,4,5,8-naphthalenetetracarboxylic dianhydride in aqueous solution. Subsequent thermal treatment of the Zn-CPP successfully resulted in the formation of porous ZnO with similar morphology to Zn-CPP. It is also found that the ZnO with enhanced (002) orientation could be obtained from Zn-CPP with preferred (002) orientation. This strategy could be extended for the preparation of other metal oxides with desired shape and structure.