Facile synthesis of prickly CoNi microwires

Novel prickly CoNi microwires have been successfully synthesized via a hydrothermal synthetic route. The samples prepared at 120 °C for 6 h were made up of large-scale wire-like assemblies with the diameter of about 3 μm and length up to several dozens microns. These wires exhibited hierarchical structure, which was constructed by thornlike crystals with the length of 300-500 nm. The morphology of the wires could be adjusted by the NaOH contents in the system. The magnetic hysteresis measurement revealed that the CoNi microwires displayed ferromagnetic behaviors with a saturation magnetization (Ms) of 83.90 emu/g and a coercivity (Hc) of 119.1 Oe.