Low temperature growth of ZnO rods by EDTA-assisted hydrothermal synthesis

One-dimensional ZnO rods about 40 mum long are prepared by low temperature disodium ethylene diamine tetraacetate (EDTA)-assisted hydrothermal method. The prepared ZnO crystals are characterized by X-ray power diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). It is found that EDTA plays an important role to crystal habit of ZnO crystal and ZnO rods can not be obtained without EDTA. Based on the supersaturation-nucleation-growth conventional crystal growth mechanism in solution together with Anion Coordination Polyhedron Growth Unity Theory, possible effect mechanism of EDTA to crystal habit of ZnO is discussed.