Properties of SnO2 and SnO2−xNx grown on the boat walls using vapor transport method

The aim of the study was to examine the properties of SnO2 and SnO2−xNx nanowires (NWs) grown on the walls of the boat of the vapor transport system. Nanowires of SnO2 and SnO2−xNx were synthesized using Ar plus O2 and N2 plus O2 gas mixtures, respectively. The obtained chemical compositions were SnO2 and SnO1.71N0.18. In both cases, tetragonal single-phase SnO2 with nanowires morphologies were obtained by X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy examinations, respectively. The NWs diameters were ranged from 150 nm to 1.6 µm, and the lengths extended to more than 400 µm for the sample grown with Ar plus O2, whereas the diameters of the NWs ranged from 30 nm to 2.1 µm and the lengths exceeded to 1 mm for the sample grown with N2 plus O2. The calculated optical band gap values were 3.54 and 3.27 eV for samples grown with Ar plus O2 and N2 plus O2, respectively. Higher photoluminescence spectrum intensity was observed for SnO2−xNx NWs. The room-temperature resistivity of SnO2−xNx was one order lower than that for SnO2 NWs and decreased upon increasing temperature, indicating a semiconducting behavior. Two activation energies were recorded for each sample.