Shape-Controlled Synthesis of Copper Indium Sulfide Nanostructures: Flowers, Platelets and Spheres

Colloidal semiconductor nanostructures have been widely investigated for several applications, which rely not only on their size but also on shape control. CuInS(2) (often abbreviated as CIS) nanostructures have been considered as candidates for solar energy conversion. In this work, three-dimensional (3D) colloidal CIS nanoflowers and nanospheres and two-dimensional (2D) nanoplatelets were selectively synthesized by changing the amount of a sulfur precursor (tert-dodecanethiol) serving both as a sulfur source and as a co-ligand. Monodisperse CIS nanoflowers (~15 nm) were formed via the aggregation of smaller CIS nanoparticles when the amount of tert-dodecanethiol used in reaction was low enough, which changed towards the formation of larger (70 nm) CIS nanospheres when it significantly increased. Both of these structures crystallized in a chalcopyrite CIS phase. Using an intermediate amount of tert-dodecanethiol, 2D nanoplatelets were obtained, 90 nm in length, 25 nm in width and the thickness of a few nanometers along the a-axis of the wurtzite CIS phase. Based on a series of experiments which employed mixtures of tert-dodecanethiol and 1-dodecanethiol, a ligand-controlled mechanism is proposed to explain the manifold range of the resulting shapes and crystal phases of CIS nanostructures.