Effects of Li and Cu dopants on structural properties of zinc oxide nanorods

• Long and well-aligned ZnO NRs were grown with the incorporation of the Li dopant.
• Optical transmittance of the LZO NRs was slightly lower than that of the ZnO NRs.
• Li dopant did not change the crystal structure of the ZnO NRs.
• The surface morphology of CZO sample is significantly different from the ZnO NRs.
• Random-oriented rods and CuO nanocrystals were grown on the surface of substrate.

We fabricated undoped zinc oxide (ZnO), Li-doped zinc oxide (LZO), and Cu-doped zinc oxide (CZO) nanorods (NRs) on fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO)-coated glass substrates using chemical solution deposition and investigated their structural properties. With the incorporation of the Li dopant, the length and crystallinity of LZO NRs increased and improved, respectively, compared to that of the ZnO NRs. The average optical transmittance of LZO NRs was slightly lower than that of the ZnO NRs, but otherwise very similar over the visible wavelength region. With the incorporation of the Cu dopant, however, the morphology of the CZO sample was remarkably different from that of the pure ZnO NRs. Rods with a length of ∼12 μm and a diameter of 0.5–1.2 μm were randomly oriented on the substrate, and copper oxide (CuO) nanocrystals were uniformly grown on the surface of substrate. This paper presents a simple way to tune the growth behaviors of the ZnO NRs by adding dopants.

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