Controlled fabrication of ordered structure-based ZnO films by electrochemical deposition

• PS templates with tunable layers assembled by a floating-transfer technique are presented.
• ZnO films with controllable morphologies are prepared by using electrochemical deposition.
• With a binary PS template, hierarchical ZnO films are obtained.

Orderly structured ZnO films were fabricated by electrochemical deposition combined with a templating method. The floating-transfer technique was used to assemble polystyrene sphere (PS) templates. Hierarchical structures containing two-diameter PS were easily assembled on the surface of F–SnO2 conductive glass (FTO). When used as a working electrode, the FTO glass coated with PS templates provided arrayed cavities to accommodate ZnO crystals under potentiostatic deposition and was ultimately covered by ordered, porous ZnO films after removal of PS templates. The morphologies of the samples were examined by field-emission scanning electron microscopy and crystallographic information for the samples was obtained from X-ray powder diffraction measurements. The results indicate that ZnO films fabricated by electrochemical deposition show excellent template replication over large areas and exhibit the typical wurtzite structure.