Temperature-dependent photoluminescence property of self-assembly ZnO nanowires via chemical vapor deposition combined with hydrothermal pretreatment

Vertically aligned ZnO nanowires with high aspect ratio were prepared by chemical vapor deposition on Si substrate, which had been catalyzed by the polar plane in [0001] direction of ZnO nanorods prepared by the hydrothermal method. Morphology and structure characterizations showed that the as-grown nanowires had the single-crystal hexagonal wurtzite structure with a [0001] growth direction. Energy Dispersive X-ray (EDX) measurement indicated the as-grown ZnO nanowires had a good deal of oxygen vacancies owing to the high operation temperature. Temperature-dependent photoluminescence measurement revealed that the peak of near-band-edge emission shifted from 380 to 387 nm with the increase of temperature from 150 to 300 K. The high intensity of the green peak at 525 nm highlighted the potential application in visible light emitting diodes.