Tuning the Morphology of GeS2 Hybrid Materials Using Ionic Liquids as Structuring Agents

Control of the surface chemistry and morphology of chalcogenide materials, which are highly polarizable, is a very interesting challenge as it might lead to breakthroughs in various fields such as electrochemistry, catalysis, and gas-phase separation. With this in mind, a new approach to synthesize structured Ge-based chalcogenide products has been investigated. It involves the use of tetraethoxygermanium (TEOG) and thioacetamide with an ionic liquid (IL) as structuring agent. This innovative synthesis process has two main advantages: it is performed under soft conditions, and it also enables the morphological control of the obtained hybrid organic-GeS2 particles. In the absence of the IL, the synthesis leads to an agglomeration of nanospheres, whereas the introduction of the ionic liquid leads either to microspheres or to gypsum rosette-like particles. It has been clearly highlighted that the morphology of the hybrid organic-GeS2 particles strongly depended on the nature of the cationic part of the IL.