Synthesis of Nanocrystalline Nickel in Pulse Deposition

Abstract

SUMMARYThis paper describes a new method developed to synthesise bulk nanocrystalline nickel. A high frequency pulse current and high deposit current density were employed to increase the deposit cathodic overpotential and the nucleation rate. With increasing peak current density, the deposit grain sizes was found to decreased markedly, e.g. average grain sizes ranging from 200 to 50 nm were determined when the peak current density varied from 60 to 300 A dm2 at the on-time of 10 μs and the off-time of 90 μs. In the saccharin-containing electrolyte, the deposit grain size ranges from 80 to 15 nm under the same conditions. The hardness of the nickel deposits was examined when the average current density ranged from 2 to 40 A dm 2.