Electrophoretic deposition of ZnO nanostructures: Au nanoclusters on Si substrates induce self-assembled nanowire growth

•ZnO nanowires were grown on silicon substrate by electrophoretic deposition technique without use a porous template.•The growth was induced by Au nanoclusters and was performed at room temperature.•The photoluminescence spectrum for the nanowires obtained shows a broad UV-blue excitonic emission peak and a low emission in the green region.

The present work reports the self-assembled growth of ZnO nanowires on silicon substrate with nanometer sized Au clusters using electrophoretic deposition technique at room temperature without a sacrificial template. A colloidal suspension of ≈5 nm sized ZnO nanoparticles dispersed in 2-propanol was used (nanoparticle bandgap of 3.47 eV as determined from absorbance measurements). The results show that the Au nanoclusters on the silicon substrate induce the self-assembly of the ZnO nanoparticles into vertically aligned ZnO nanowires. This effect is tentatively explained as being due to increased electric field intensities near the Au nanoclusters during the electrophoretic deposition. Photoluminescence measurements reveal the presence of quantum confined excitons and a relatively low concentration of deep defects in the nanowires. The electric field guided growth of semiconductor nanostructures at room temperature has great industrial potential as it minimizes production costs and enables the use of substrate materials not withstanding high temperatures.