Structural, optical and electrical properties of copper composite ZrO2 nanoparticles prepared via sol-gel method

In the present work, pure and copper composite zirconium oxide nanoparticles with a different percentages of copper (0.02, 0.04, 0.06 and 0.08%) were successfully synthesized by a low cost sol-gel technique. It was found that as-prepared samples of copper-composite (zirconium oxide) ZrO2 nanoparticles are in monoclinic phase. The copper-doped zirconium oxide (ZrO2) NPs are present as spherical morphology and highly agglomeration confirmed by scanning electron microscopy and high resolution transmission electron microscope analyses. The synthesis samples exhibited two bandgap energy at 3.6 eV and 2.6 eV, 3.57 eV and 2.4 eV, 3.55 eV and 2.14 eV, and 3.5 eV and 2.1 eV. The presence of functional groups and the chemical bonding is confirmed by FT-IR spectra. PL spectra of the pure and Cu-doped ZrO2 nanoparticles exhibited oxygen vacancies. Voltage-current characteristics of pure and composite ZrO2 nanoparticles are studied at vary incident light intensity that show the negative photoconductivity.