The iChEM researcher, Prof. Angang Dong’s group in FDU collaborated with Prof. Fudong Wang and William Buhro in Washington University to investigate the solution-liquid-solid (SLS) and related solution-based methods for the synthesis of semiconductor nanowires and nanorods. Most recently, they published a review paper “Solution–Liquid–Solid Synthesis, Properties, and Applications of One-Dimensional Colloidal Semiconductor Nanorods and Nanowires” on Chemical Reviews (Chem. Rev. DOI: 10.1021/acs.chemrev.5b00701).

Semiconductor nanowires due to its unique one-dimensional structure have been widely applied in field-effect transistors, lithium-ion batteries, photocathodes, photovoltaics, and photodetection. At present, semiconductor nanowires are mainly prepared by gas phase (VLS) and liquid phase (SLS) method. The semiconductor nanowires prepared by SLS has the characteristics of small and uniform diameter and may potentially be ideal structure model for two-dimension quantum confinement effect. The nanowires can be uniformly dispersed in the organic solvent to form a stable colloidal solution, which lay a good foundation on the development of large-scale self-assembly and device applications. The nanowire synthesis, structure characterization, optical characterization and device applications for nearly 20 years in related fields of research are discussed in this article and the development of nanowires in solution method are prospected.

Paper link: http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.chemrev.5b00701