Characteristics and optical properties of MgO nanowires synthesized by solvothermal method

Magnesium oxide (MgO) nanowires were synthesized by solvothermal method using magnesium nitrate hexahydrate and sodium hydroxide. Field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) and transmission scanning electron microscopy (TEM) measurements indicate that the product consists of a large quantity of nanowires with average diameter of 20 nm and average length of several micrometers. Explorations of X-ray diffraction (XRD), energy dispersive analysis of X-ray (EDAX), Fourier transformer infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), selected area electronic diffraction (SAED) and high-resolution transmission electron microscope (HRTEM) indicate that the product is high-quality cubic single-crystalline nanowires. The optical properties of the samples are investigated using UV–visible spectroscopy to study the refractive index and optical dielectric constant. The photoluminescence (PL) measurement suggests that the product has an intensive emission centered at 437 nm, showing that the product has potential application in optical devices. The advantages of our method lie in high yield, the easy availability of the starting materials and allowing their large-scale production at low cost.