Synthesis of TeO2 nanowires via a facile thermal oxidation method

TeO2 is of considerable interest for piezoelectric, ther-moelectric, acousto-optic and nonlinear optical applica-tions. In this work, we report a facile synthetic tech-nique for obtaining high-quality TeO2 nanowires (NWs) via a thermal oxidation of Te NWs in a large quantity. The synthetic conditions were systematically optimized to transform from Te NWs to TeO2 NWs using a furnace oven. The optimal conditions for the formation of high-quality TeO2 NWs were found to be 300 degrees C for 1 hr in an oven furnace. The NWs were characterized using X-ray diffraction, field-emission scanning electron mi-croscopy, high resolution transmission electron micros-copy and Raman scattering. Diffuse reflectance spec-trum was also used to determine the band gap (3.78 eV) of synthesized TeO2 NWs.