Rapid Microwave-Assisted Synthesis of Single-Crystalline Sb₂Te₃ Hexagonal Nanoplates

Abstract

A simple and rapid microwave-assisted wet chemical route was developed for the preparation of Sb 2 Te 3 hexagonal single-crystalline nanoplates with edge length of hundreds of nanometers. The products were characterized with X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM), transmission electron microscope (TEM), and selected area electron diffraction (SAED) techniques. The reaction mechanism was proposed and the effects of alkali, solvents, and stimulating factors such as ultrasonic wave and solvothermal process were studied. The effects of some additives were also discussed, and PVP (polyvinyl pyrrolidone) was found to be able to regularize and diminish the nanoplates.

Electronic properties of (Sb;Bi)2Te3 colloidal heterostructured nanoplates down to the single particle level

“…The chemical synthesis of Sb 2 Te 3 nanoplates has been investigated using solvothermal methods in aqueous 25 – 28 , or polar organic solvents 29 – 31 . We see two main limitations to these approaches, which are ( i ) the risk of oxidation of the material, and ( ii ) the final thickness of the nanoplate being limited to thick sheets (>50 nm 26 , 27 ).…”

Single‐Source Precursor‐Based Deposition of Sb2Te3 Films by MOCVD**

“…Bulk Sb 2 Te 3 finds widespread technical applications in minipower‐generation systems and micro‐coolers, charge coupled device (CCD) technology, and infrared detectors . Since nanostructuring is expected to further enhance the figure of merit due to reduction of the thermal conductivity, Sb 2 Te 3 films and nanostructures with well‐defined morphologies have been fabricated both via solution phase and gas phase processes such as solvothermal processes, microwave heating, vapor transport growth, vapor‐liquid‐solid growth, electrochemical atomic layer epitaxy, electrochemical deposition, DC and RF sputtering, and molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) processes . In addition, MOCVD using trialkylstibanes SbR 3 (R = Me, Et) and dialkyltellanes TeR′ 2 (R = Et, i Pr) have been successfully employed …”

Synthesis of Hexagonal Sb2Te3 Nanoplates by Thermal Decomposition of the Single-Source Precursor (Et2Sb)2Te.

“…Antimony telluride nanostructures with well defined morphologies can be synthesized by gas phase processes such as chemical vapor deposition [37][38][39] and vapor transport growth, 40 as well as in solution by hydrothermal processes 23,[41][42][43][44][45][46] and by microwave heating. 47 As-formed Sb2Te3 nanoparticles typically showed enhanced Seebeck coefficients and reduced thermal conductivity compared to bulk Sb2Te3. 40,48,49,50 In addition, compound materials of antimony and tellurium are a new class of thermoelectric materials, and very recently, an enhanced thermoelectric power factor (∼2 μW/(cm•K 2 )) was reported for AgxTey-Sb2Te3 heterostructured films.…”