Gluconate controls one-dimensional growth of tellurium nanostructures

In this paper, we show for the first time that by using sodium gluconate-assisted solution route, fine, uniform, and single-crystalline tellurium nanorods and nanowires can be synthesized. Sodium gluconate is a green and safe chemical with strong chelating function, and this property may be useful in the fabrication of nanomaterials, especially one-dimensional (1D) nanomaterials. The sodium gluconate acts as both reducing agent and morphology-directing agent and by adjusting the experimental parameters, the lengths and the diameters of the tellurium nanorods could be further controlled in a certain range. This method is a simple and economical route for 1D nanostructure fabrication and might bring about a novel concept for the synthesis of 1D nanostructures with bio-ligand, sodium gluconate.