A facile two-step hydrothermal route for the synthesis of low-dimensional structured Bi2Te3 nanocrystals with various morphologies

Bi2Te3 nanostructures with various morphologies such as nanotubes, needle-shaped nanowires, nanoflakes and flower-like clusters have been obtained through a facile two-step hydrothermal route using sodium-dodecyl-benzene-sulfonate (SDBS) and polyvinyl-pyrrolidone (PVP) as surfactants. Products were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The characterizations of XRD and SEM reveal that these products are pure Bi2Te3 and the structure is uniform. The structures and sizes of the samples are conformed by the TEM images. Results show that the surfactant plays a key role in the formation of the nanostructures. The temperature also has influence on the morphology of the final product. Furthermore, the possible mechanisms of the nanostructures have been preliminarily presented.