4.6 Article

Room-Temperature Interconversion Between Ultrathin CdTe Magic-Size Nanowires Induced by Ligand Shell Dynamics

Journal

JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL CHEMISTRY C
Volume -, Issue -, Pages -

Publisher

AMER CHEMICAL SOC
DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpcc.2c04113

Keywords

-

Funding

  1. Division of Chemical Sciences (CW) of The Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) [TOP.715.016.001]

Ask authors/readers for more resources

This study reported the room temperature synthesis of ultrathin CdTe magic-size nanowires, revealing their growth mechanism and the crucial role of primary alkylamines in the growth process.
The formation mechanisms of colloidal magic-size semiconductor nanostructures have remained obscure. Herein, we report the room temperature synthesis of three species of ultrathin CdTe magic-size nanowires (MSNWs) with diameters of 0.7 +/- 0.1 nm, 0.9 +/- 0.2 nm, and 1.1 +/- 0.2 nm, and lowest energy exciton transitions at 373, 418, and 450 nm, respectively. The MSNWs are obtained from Cd(oleate)2 and TOP-Te, provided diphenylphosphine and a primary alkylamine (RNH2) are present at sufficiently high concentrations, and exhibit sequential, discontinuous growth. The population of each MSNW species is entirely determined by the RNH2 concentration [RNH2] so that single species are only obtained at specific concentrations, while mixtures are obtained at concentrations intermediate between the specific ones. Moreover, the MSNWs remain responsive to [RNH2], interconverting from thinner to thicker upon [RNH2] decrease and from thicker to thinner upon [RNH2] increase. Our results allow us to propose a mechanism for the formation and interconversion of CdTe MSNWs and demonstrate that primary alkylamines play crucial roles in all four elementary kinetic steps (viz., monomer formation, nucleation, growth in length, and interconversion between species), thus being the decisive element in the creation of a reaction pathway that leads exclusively to CdTe MSNWs. The insights provided by our work thus contribute toward unravelling the mechanisms behind the formation of shape-controlled and atomically precise magic-size semiconductor nanostructures.

Authors

I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.

Reviews

Primary Rating

4.6
Not enough ratings

Secondary Ratings

Novelty
-
Significance
-
Scientific rigor
-
Rate this paper

Recommended

No Data Available
No Data Available