Insights in the two-step synthesis of single crystalline Ag2Te nanorods

Pure monoclinic single crystalline Ag2Te nanorods were synthesized by a two-step method. The first step concerns the electrodeposition of self-standing Te nanorods in an ionic liquid medium, taking advantage of its templating properties. These obtained nanorods are single crystalline with growth direction along the [001] axis in the hexagonal lattice. The average diameter of the as-deposited Te nanorods is 60 ± 13 nm with less than 300 nm long. Afterwards, the resulting nanostructured Te film is immerged in a dedicated silver-based bath in order to be transformed into Ag2Te binary compounds by a combined mechanism of chemical cementation and topotactic transformation. The chemical analysis reveals that the final nanostructures exhibit a slight excess of silver and TEM-SAED analysis shows that they are still single crystalline with an increase of the initial diameter, less than 30%. HR-TEM highlights the presence of an intermediate stützite phase and the hessite phase α-Ag2Te is obtained at the end of the synthesis process. [Display omitted] •Synthesis of single crystalline Ag2Te nanorods in 2-steps: Te nanorods electrodeposition followed by chemical cementation.•Synthesis in mild conditions without any addition of reducing agents or toxic solvents unlike the usual used methods.•The topotactic reaction of Te transformation into Ag2Te with stützite intermediate phase formation is highlighted.•The crystallinity of the Te nanorods is conserved during the chemical cementation into silver telluride Ag2Te nanorods.•The resulted silver telluride Ag2Te nanorods are highly pure, one dimensional, single crystalline monoclinic hessite.