A quantitative study of chemical kinetics for the synthesis of doped oxide nanocrystals using FTIR

The synthesis of Mg-doped ZnO nanocrystals was employed as a model system to quantitatively study the chemical kinetics of the precursor conversion reactions at synthetic conditions and the correlations with the formation of doped nanocrystals. An accurate method using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy was developed to explore the alcoholysis reactions of the cationic precursors. Our study showed that three independent factors, molar ratio of dopant precursor, reaction temperature and coordination ligands of cationic precursors influenced the relative reactivity of magnesium to zinc precursor, and in turn the formation of Mg-doped ZnO nanocrystals with defined shapes and properties. This understanding underpins the advancement of the syntheses of doped nanocrystals and should be useful for future rational design of new synthetic systems.