Ambient template-directed synthesis of single-crystalline alkaline earth metal fluoride nanowires

INOR 638

Fen Zhang, fezhang@ic.sunysb.edu, Department of Chemistry, State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, NY 11794, Yuanbing Mao, ymao@ic.sunysb.edu, Department of Chemistry, SUNY at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, NY 11794, and Stanislaus S. Wong, sswong@notes.cc.sunysb.edu, Department of Chemistry, SUNY at Stony Brook and Materials Science Department, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Stony Brook, NY 11794.
Fluorides have been widely used in optics and as components in semiconductor-on-insulator structures. In addition, fluorides doped with rare-earth ions have also been reported to display unique luminescence properties. It is reasonable to expect that nanoscale fluorides will play an important role in technological applications including as high-density optical storage devices, nanosensors, and color displays. Herein, we demonstrate that a family of single-crystalline alkaline earth metal fluoride nanowires, as well as their rare-earth ion doped analogues can be successfully prepared using a modified template-directed method at ambient room temperature conditions, without the use of either sophisticated experimental setups or high-temperature annealing. Moreover, the diameters of the as-fabricated nanowires could be controlled by choosing commercially available polycarbonate membranes with predictable pore sizes. The luminescent properties of lanthanide-doped binary fluoride nanowires imply the possible incorporation into nanoscale devices via a more thorough investigation of their optical and optoelectronic properties.