Facile electrochemical approach to fabricate hierarchical flowerlike gold microstructures: Electrodeposited superhydrophobic surface

A templateless, surfactantless, electrochemical approach is proposed to directly fabricate hierarchical flowerlike gold microstructures (HFGMs) on an indium tin oxide (ITO) substrate. The as-prepared HFGMs have been characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and cyclic voltammetry. The HFGMs prepared by simple square wave voltammetry technique exhibit flowerlike microstructures and are built with many staggered nanosheets as building blocks. The diameter and density of the HFGMs can be easily controlled via simply controlling the repetitive run times of square wave voltammetry. Moreover, after further chemisorption of a self-assembled monolayer of n-dodecanethiol, the as-prepared compact surface becomes superhydrophobic with a contact angle as high as 154°.