Metal oxides are highly important as components in heterogeneous catalysts. It is also well established that as the building blocks of nanoscaled materials get smaller, surfaces become increasingly important in determining their properties. Very early on, researchers found that catalytic activity is only indirectly related to the surface area; in fact it depends on the density of active sites. ...

Three-dimensional (3D) ZnO–CuO core-shell nanorod arrays have been synthesized by a three-step process on silicon (100) substrates. A hydrothermal method was used to grow 3D ZnO nanorod arrays, followed by deposition of Cu nanofilm using sputtering, which was oxidized subsequently at 400 C to form CuO shell surrounding ZnO nanorod core. The control over oxygen flow and pressure during the Cu na...

The antibacterial and antibiofilm activity of chemically synthesized pure and Cu doped ZnO nanoparticles against marine biofilm forming bacteria has been reported for the first time. The synthesized nanoparticles were characterized using PXRD, FTIR and SEM which confirmed the formation of phase pure nanostructured zinc oxides. The antibacterial and antibiofilm activities of the synthesized nano...

a r t i c l e i n f o The in-situ synthesis of Cu/ZnO crystalline nanofibers is presented. The composite nanofibers are formed through the calcination and reduction of as-electrospun fibers consisting of poly(vinyl pyrrolidone) as well as Cu and ZnO precursors. The crystal structure and morphology of the synthesized fibers were characterized using X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy...

In this work, a facile and versatile solution route was used to fabricate room-temperature ferromagnetic fish bone-like, pteridophyte-like, poplar flower-like, cotton-like Cu@Cu2O architectures and golfball-like Cu@ZnO architecture. The ferromagnetic origins in these architectures were found to be around metal-semiconductor interfaces and defects, and the root cause for their ferromagnetism lay...

Zincian georgeite, an amorphous copper-zinc hydroxycarbonate, has been prepared by co-precipitation using acetate salts and ammonium carbonate. Incorporation of zinc into the georgeite phase and mild ageing conditions inhibits crystallisation into zincian malachite or aurichalcite. This zincian georgeite precursor was used to prepare a Cu/ZnO catalyst, which exhibits a superior performance to a...

Zincian georgeite, an amorphous copper–zinc hydroxycarbonate, has been prepared by co-precipitation using acetate salts and ammonium carbonate. Incorporation of zinc into the georgeite phase and mild ageing conditions inhibits crystallisation into zincian malachite or aurichalcite. This zincian georgeite precursor was used to prepare a Cu/ZnO catalyst, which exhibits a superior performance to a...

The metal-doping into the photocatalyst was evaluated for the photocatalytic degradation of bisphenol A in aqueous solution with ZnO powder. Au/ZnO, Ag/ZnO and Cu/ZnO were tested in the present work. Ag-doping ZnO was effective for the improvement of efficiency for the photocatalytic degradation of bisphenol A in water. The optimum doping concentration of silver was found to be 3 wt%. The pseud...

The prospect of tuning and enhancing multiple properties of ZnO from optical, electrical, piezo to ferroelectricity/magnetism with Cu dopants will certainly spur the pursuit of facile doping methodology to immensely advance this field of research. Here, a one-step aqueous synthesis of Cu-doped ZnO nanostructured materials with effective controllability over the morphology (film to nanowire) and...

The bulk structure of copper in various binary Cu/ZnO catalysts for steam reforming of methanol under activation and working conditions is studied by in situ X-ray diffraction (XRD) and X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS). The evolution of bulk phases from CuO/ZnO precursors during activation with hydrogen was studied using temperature programmed reduction (TPR) (448 – 523 K, 2 vol-% H2 with an...