Green synthesis of MgO nanowires employing solar thermal energy

抄録

MgO nanowires were synthesized by an unique thermal evaporation technique employing solar energy at atmospheric pressure in air. In the conventional thermal evaporation technique, electrical furnace was heated to high temperatures and kept for a long time at the high temperatures for vaporizing source materials. Thus the significant amount of electric energy is consumed. However in the present method, solar thermal energy instead of electricity was used as the heat source for the evaporation of metal precursor. Sunlight was focused on the Mg powder through a magnifying lens to concentrate solar thermal energy. The concentrated solar energy created heat enough to vaporize the Mg powder. Then the Mg vapor reacted with oxygen in air to form MgO nanowires. Furthermore, the MgO nanowires were synthesized within a few seconds, which indicates that this method has also an advantage of synthesizing rapidly MgO nanowires.