Ultrathin nanorod-assembled SnO2 hollow cubes for high sensitive n-butanol detection.

Graphical abstract Highlights • Rational assembly of hierarchical SnO 2 hollow cubes with well-aligned ultrathin primary nanorods. • Well-aligned nanorod-assembled cubic structure maintains highly porous and activated surfaces. • Ultrathin primary nanorods and less-agglomerated configuration promote n-butanol sensing characteristics. Abstract A new type of nonspherical hollow nanocubes functionalized with well-aligned rodlike building blocks have been successfully prepared via a facile one-pot hydrothermal approach in case of SnO 2. The structural and morphological characterization reveals that the dense rodlike SnO 2 subunits are vertically distributed on all of the six equivalent facets of cubic structure. The rodlike primary building blocks with a uniform diameter of about 5 nm exhibit a single-crystalline rutile structure. A two-step sequential growth model is proposed based on observation from a time-dependent evolution process, revealing that the initially formed of well-defined ZnSn(OH) 6 solid cubes can serve as sacrifice self-template for the interior hollowing and vertical growth of SnO 2 nanorods. Moreover, gas sensor based on SnO 2 nanocages exhibits the enhanced sensing performances to n-butanol. The significant decrease in response-recovery time can be attributed not only to the interior cavities combined with permeable shells for fast transfer of gas molecules, but also to these high-activated rodlike subunits with ultrathin diameter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]