Facile Synthesis, Shape Evolution, and Photocatalytic Activity of Truncated Cuprous Oxide Octahedron Microcrystals with Hollows

Microcrystals of cuprous oxide (Cu 2 O) samples exhibiting different morphologies such as rods, hexapods, octahedra, and truncated octahedra with hollows were synthesized via a facile hydrothermal method and were then characterized by X-ray powder diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). It was observed that the reaction time had a prominent effect on the aforementioned morphologies. The crystal growth processes have been proposed. Furthermore, the photocatalytic activities of the prepared Cu 2 O microcrystals were investigated by UV−vis spectrophotometry, demonstrating that their behavior was influenced by the different morphologies, and the truncated octahedra with hollow microcrystals possessed the highest activity.