Microwave-assisted synthesis of high aspect ratio ruthenium nanorods

Poly (iV-viny1-2-pyrrolidone) (PVP)-stabilized ruthenium nanorods with high aspect ratio by refluxing ruthenium(HI) chloride in n-propanol have been successfully prepared by means of a facile and rapid microwave heating for the first time. The structure and morphology of the obtained products were characterized by transmission electron microscopy (TEM), select area electron diffraction (SAED), ultraviolet-visible spectrophotometry (UV-vis), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and Fourier transform spectroscopy (FT-IR). XPS analysis reveals that the nanorods were in the metallic state. TEM images showed that ruthenium nanorods had an obvious one-dimensional structure with the aspect ratio ranged from 5 to 40 nm and length up to 600 nm. SAED patterns indicated that the nanorods were single-crystalline with a hexagonal structure.