Controlled Growth of Copper Germanate Nanoflowers

Copper germanate nanoflowers have been successfully synthesized using a simple hydrothermal deposition route by controlling hydrothermal temperature and time. The as-synthesized products were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), element mapping, transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and high-resolution TEM (HRTEM). XRD results show that the CuGeO₃ nanoflowers are mainly composed of orthorhombic structure. It has been found that the CuGeO₃ nanoflowers contain many radial single crystalline nanowires with the diameter of 20–100 nm and the length of several dozens of micrometers. The formation process of the CuGeO₃ nanoflowers is interpreted in terms of the general theory of the crystalline nucleation and growth combined with the splitting crystal growth mechanism.