The Influence Of Incorporating Cobalt (Co) And Indium (In) Co-dopants On The Structural And Optical properties Of ZnO Nanoparticles

¹Department of Physics, University of Limpopo, Private Bag x1106, Sovenga 0727, South Africa

²DST/CSIR National Centre for Nano-Structured Materials, P O Box 325, Pretoria 0001, South Africa

³Materials Research Department, iThemba labs, P O Box 722, Somerset West 7129, South Africa

Adv. Mater. Lett., 2017, 8 (1), pp 37-41

DOI: 10.5185/amlett.2017.6876

Publication Date (Web): Nov 12, 2016

Copyright © IAAM-VBRI Press

E-mail: Thuto.Mosuang@ul.ac.za

Abstract

Co and In co-doped nanopowders of ZnO as well as In and Co singly doped ZnO were successfully prepared using sol-gel method. The synthesized samples were characterized using x-ray diffraction (XRD), UV-vis spectroscopy (UV-vis), Raman spectroscopy (RS), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) and Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS). The effects of In and Co co-doping on the structural and optical properties were investigated. XRD results showed no peaks associated with In³⁺ or Co²⁺ ions indicating that In³⁺ and Co²⁺ ions substituted for Zn²⁺ ions in the ZnO wurtzite structure, this was corroborated by the EDS results. Doping ZnO nanoparticles with In and Co significantly reduced the grain sizes whereas the lattice parameters were not significantly affected. TEM results confirmed that the nanoparticles were spherically shaped. Raman spectroscopy also confirmed that the ZnO nanoparticles were of a wurtzite hexagonal structure. Single doping reduced the energy band gaps and co-doping reduced them even further.

Keywords

ZnO nanoparticles, sol-gel method, co-doping, structural properties, optical properties.