Ultra-long Fe nanowires by pulsed electrodeposition with full filling of alumina templates

Abstract

With the increasing demand for high quality methods for the fast fabrication of extremely high aspect ratio nanoparticles, the research for efficient, low-cost and simple techniques has become fundamental. A promising approach on the synthesis of these materials is here addressed. Pulsed electrodeposition in porous anodic alumina templates was improved enabling, for the first time, a simple and cost effective fabrication method for vertically aligned nanomaterials with aspect ratios never reported with this method. Iron nanowires were electrodeposited and the effect of electrolyte molar concentration, temperature and stirring, pulse shape and barrier layer thickness on the deposition quality was investigated to potentially increase the template filling and the nanowires length. The electrodeposition temperature and current density were also found to be determinant parameters affecting NWs crystallography. A methodology of surface response design of experiment was conducted to retrieve the optimum values for the deposition parameters. With the determined optimized process, we were able to obtain filling ratios up to 93% and aspect ratios over 10 times higher than previous reports for an alternating current method. The high deposition homogeneity combined with the simplicity of the pulsed deposition method, can open new opportunities for the nanofabrication of nanowires. (c) 2014 IOP Publishing Ltd.