In this paper, the spherical particles growth during lithium electrodeposition was investigated by directly solving the governing equations based on the Landau transformation method. The basic growth kinetic characteristics of a spherical particle during electrodeposition was studied. Predicted results show that the dynamic oscillation of the growth velocity occurs during the spherical particle growth. It was found from numerical simulations that applied electrical potential difference, electrolyte concentration, and diffusion coefficient are 3 main factors influencing the spherical growth and the existence of the dynamic oscillation state of the growth velocity during electrodeposition. The increase in both the applied electrical potential difference and the electrolyte concentration can lead to the increase of the growth velocity of the spherical particle, while the growth velocity is independent of the diffusion coefficient. Moreover, it was found that the wavelength and the amplitude of the dynamic oscillation of the growth velocity can be influenced by the applied electrical potential difference, the electrolyte concentration, and the diffusion coefficient. We determined that the dynamic competition between electrochemical reactions and ion transport in the electrodeposition is the reason for the existence of the oscillation of the growth velocity.

The hierarchical binary CdS/NiO hollow heterogeneous architectures (HHAs) with p–n heterojunction are constructed by a facile microwave-assisted wet chemical process for high-efficient photocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) from water. The as-designed CdS/NiO HHAs are composed of hexagonal n-type CdS nanoparticles with a size in the range of 20–40 nm attaching to cubic p-type NiO hollow microspheres (HMSs) which are aggregates of porous nanoplates with a thickness of about 20 nm. The photocatalytic water splitting over CdS/NiO HHAs is significantly increased under simulated solar irradiation, among which the most active sample of CdS/NiO-3 (the mass ratio of CdS to NiO is 1:3) exhibits the fastest photocatalytic HER rate of 1.77 mmol∙g⁻¹∙h⁻¹, being 16.2 times than that of pure CdS. The boosted photocatalytic HER could be attributed to the synergistic effect on the proportional p–n heterojunction with special hierarchical hollow and porous morphology, an enhancement of visible light absorption, and an improvement of photoinduced charge separation as well as the photo-stability given by the composite heterojunction. This work shows a viable strategy to design the heterojunction with special morphology for the efficient hydrogen generation by water splitting utilizing solar energy.

Material properties are strongly dependent on material structure. The large diversity and complexity of material structures provide significant opportunities to improve the properties of the materials, expanding their applications. Here, we discuss the fabrication of a multifunctional silver film prepared by controlling the nucleation and growth of silver particles. Silver films with high hydrophobicity and antibacterial activity were fabricated by adopting an electrochemical approach. The dependence of the hydrophobic and antibacterial properties on the size and shape of the silver particles was first investigated. Small-sized silver particles exhibited a high antibacterial rate, while a porous silver film composed of dendritic particles showed a significant hydrophobic activity. By regulating the reaction time, current density, and silver salt concentration, a silver film with a contact angle of 150.9° and an antibacterial rate of 54.7% was synthesized. This study demonstrates that finding a compromise between different material structures is a suitable way to fabricate multifunctional devices.