Synthesis of Cu₂O Nanoframes and Nanocages by Selective Oxidative Etching at Room Temperature

Hollow Cu2O nanostructures with uniform size (see SEM and TEM images) were obtained by oxidative etching of truncated octahedral particle precursors. A unique feature of the as-synthesized nanoframes is that the six {100} faces are absent, and thus they are constructed of eight hexagonal {111} faces, which are expected to be more catalytically active.