Regular Article

Morphology-controlled synthesis of cuprous oxide nanoparticles by plasma electrochemistry and its photocatalytic activity

¹ Department of Electronic Science, Fujian Provincial Key Laboratory of Plasma and Magnetic Resonance, Institute of Electromagnetics and Acoustics, Xiamen University, Xiamen 361005, P.R. China
² College of Materials, Xiamen University, Xiamen 361005, P.R. China

^a Present address: Division of Quantum Science and Engineering, Hokkaido University, Sapporo 060-8628, Japan
^b e-mail: chenqiang@xmu.edu.cn

Received: 6 March 2018
Received in final form: 31 July 2018
Published online: 15 January 2019

Abstract

A plasma-NaCl aqueous solution system has been used to synthesize cuprous oxide (Cu₂O) nanoparticles. In this plasma electrochemical system, the argon plasma located above the liquid surface is used as cathode, while a copper plate partially immersed into the aqueous solution as the counter electrode. At the anode zone, the anodic dissolution of Cu plate releases Cu²⁺ into aqueous solution and then transports and reacts in the plasma–liquid interactions zone. The results show that the morphology of the synthesized Cu₂O nanoparticles ranges from irregular shape to spherical structure by altering the concentration of surfactant of cetyltrimethyl ammonium bromide. In addition, the obtained Cu₂O nanoparticles with spherical structure have been confirmed to have enhanced visible-light photocatalytic performance of methyl orange degradation.