Growth mechanism of needle-shaped ZnO nanostructures over NiO-coated Si substrates

ZnO nanostructures were synthesized over NiO-coated Si substrate by a thermal evaporation of Zn powders in a vertical chemical vapor deposition reactor. The ZnO nanostructures had a needle-like morphology and the diameter of the structures decreased linearly from the bottom to the top. The bottom diameters of the ZnO nano-needles normally ranged from 20–100 nm and the lengths were in the range of 2–3 Μm. The clear lattice fringes in HRTEM image indicated the growth of good quality hexagonal single-crystal ZnO. Field emission characteristics of the ZnO nano-needles showed that the turn-on field was about 8.87 V/Μm with a field enhancement factor of about 1099. The growth mechanism of the ZnO nano-needles was proposed on the basis of experimental data.