Boron nitride (BN) has been synthesized using hydrothermal synthesis method. The experimental results showed that the pH value of the reaction solution has an important effect on the yield and phases of BN samples. As the pH value decreased, the content of cBN increased and the yield improved. The increase in cBN content is resulted from the conversion of oBN into cBN under hydrothermal condition, and the growth of cBN nanocrystals may due to the decrease in the reaction speed, thus the crystalline perfection of BN improved when the pH value decreased.
Novel bulk ZnO porous nanosolids were pre- pared by a unique solvothermal hot-press method, using ZnO nanoparticles and several kinds of solvents as the start- ing materials. It was found from the experiments that ZnO nanoparticles underwent a “self-assembly process” under some specific hydrothermal hot-press conditions. As a result, some “nanoflowers” formed. The results showed that porous nanosolids with uniform pore diameters could be obtained when water distributed uniformly among the ZnO nanopar- ticles. On the contrary, if the uniformity of the distribution of water was poor, “nanoflowers” would appear in the wa- ter-rich region. It was also found that the photoluminescence of ZnO porous nanosolids was affected by the self-assembly phenomenon. In addition, the results also showed that, both the volume and diameters of the pores could be adjusted by changing either the hot-press temperature, pressure or the kinds of solvents.