Sonochemical Synthesis And Properties Of Copper-based Nanomaterials

Copper-based nanomaterials are widely applied in photocatalysis, cell, sensor materials, superconductor and so on, due to their unique physical and chemical propertities. Sonochemical method has been proven to be a very efficient and economical method for the preparation of nanomaterials. In this thesis, different Cu-containing nanomaterials have been successfully synthesized through a fast and facile sonochemical method, and their properties have also been studied. The main contents are as follows:1. Carambolla-like CuO hierarchical nanostructures with diameters of about200nm and lengths of600nm have been successfully synthesized through a fast and facile sonochemical method. The morphology, crystallinity and size of the as-prepared products were confirmed by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The amount of EDTA and pH value on the morphology of the final product have been studied. A possible growth process of carambolla-like CuO nanostructures has been proposed. In addition, the nonlinear optical property of carambolla-like CuO nanostructures has also been investigated, indicating that these nanomaterials have potential future application in nonlinear optics.2. Carambolla-like CuO hierarchical nanostructures have been successfully synthesized through a fast and facile sonochemical method. Then Ag3PO4nanoparticles were deposited onto the surface of CuO via a facile in-situ precipitation technique. The structure, composition and morphology of the as-synthesized products were characterized by means of X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), UV-vis spectra. The photocatalytic activity of the nanocomposite was evaluated by the degradation of rhodamine B under simulated sunlight irradiation. The results indicated that this novel Ag3PO4/CuO composite exhibited significantly higher photocatalytic activities than the pure Ag3PO4nanoparticles and pure CuO. In addition, the possible mechanism for the enhanced photocatalytic properties of the Ag3PO4/CuO composite was also discussed.3. Urchin-like CuCrO4nanostructures have been successfully synthesized via a facile and fast sonochemical route. The composition, morphology and size of the as- obtained product were characterized by X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), and high resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM). These results showed that the as-synthesized CuCrO4urchins have numerous small nanowires with average diameters of1μm. Typical CuCrO4nanowires have diameters of10nm and lengths of200nm. Studies found that ethylenediamine tetraacetic acid disodium salt (Na2EDTA) plays an important role to the morphology of the products. The self-assembly and oriented attachment procedure has been proposed for the possible formation mechanism. The Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area of the urchin-like nanostructures calculated from the nitrogen adsorption-desorption isotherm is about78m2g-1. Additionally, room-temperature photoluminescence of the CuCrO4with different morphologies has also been investigated.