In:
CrystEngComm, Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), Vol. 24, No. 34 ( 2022), p. 6009-6017
Abstract:
Nanocrystals of VO 2 (B) have attracted significant attention for their promising performance in electrochemical energy storage applications. Phase-purity and nanocrystal morphology are both crucial factors for the performance of these materials, but given the large number of crystal polymorphs available to VO 2 , achieving simultaneous control over crystal phase and nanocrystal size is a significant synthetic challenge. This paper describes the impact of water concentration on the synthesis of VO 2 (B) nanocrystals via solvothermal reaction of a molecular V( iv ) precursor in toluene. Using controlled, stoichiometric amounts of water (20 equivalents per vanadium centre) enables access to short nanorods of VO 2 (B) whose lengths follow a Gaussian distribution with an average and standard deviation of 110 ± 30 nm. Decreasing the amount of water present to two or four equivalents results in formation of VO 2 (A) nanocrystals and eliminating it entirely results in no reaction. Increasing the amount of water to more than 20 equivalents increases the average length of the VO 2 (B) nanorods and causes the distribution in rod lengths to evolve from Gaussian to lognormal. This evolution in the size distribution is consistent with changes in a model Gaussian distribution observed upon simulated end-to-end oriented attachment events. These results demonstrate that control over the concentration of water is a useful strategy for tuning the morphology and crystal phase of VO 2 nanocrystals.
Type of Medium:
Online Resource
ISSN:
1466-8033
Language:
English
Publisher:
Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)
Publication Date:
2022
detail.hit.zdb_id:
2025075-7
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