Malic acid assisted precursor route to hierarchical structured nickel oxide

A novel malic acid assisted precursor route to prepare NiO materials with novel hierarchical structures has been investigated in this work. The Ni-based precursors can be synthesized by a malic acid-assisted hydrothermal route, which have been characterized by powder X-ray diffraction (XRD), field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). NiO materials can be prepared via the thermal treatment of the precursor in ambient atmosphere. The XRD, SEM, Energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS) and UV-Vis spectroscopy of the NiO materials were also examined. The effects of the reaction conditions, such as the reaction temperature, the quantity of the raw materials on the morphologies of the precursors were discussed, which indicates that it is an effective method to synthesize NiO materials with different hierarchical structures. (C) 2010 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim