Optical and structural properties of graphene oxide-incorporated polyvinylpyrrolidone/copper ternary nanocomposites (PVP/Cu/GO) films

Abstract

Novel ternary nanocomposite films based on polyvinylpyrrolidone copper nanoparticles graphene oxide (PVP/Cu/GO) were prepared using electrochemical deposition technique on Fluorine doped tin oxide (FTO) substrate. This facile and effective approach has been proven to be very useful for the fabrication of inexpensive, high-performance electrochemical devices.  To achieve uniform deposition of the nanocomposite films, the three components of the nanocomposites were mixed under controlled conditions. The impact of different GO loading on the PVP/Cu/GO composites was measured using UV–visible spectroscopy, X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) spectroscopy, SEM, EDX, and four-point probe techniques to evaluate their optical, structural, morphological, compositional, and electrical properties, respectively. UV-visible analysis shows that the optical band gap (Eg) of the nanocomposite decreased from 3.51 to 2.02 eV with increasing GO loading. All of the nanocomposites showed UV absorbance of ≈450 nm. According to the XRD results, the GO materials were very well dispersed in the PVP/Cu/GO composites, while also revealing the crystalline nature of the nanocomposites. The SEM results revealed spherical-shaped grains of the deposited films, while the EDX results revealed the major elements deposited. Four-point probe analysis of the nanocomposites revealed slight increase in conductivity with low GO content, thus confirming the semiconducting properties of the nanocomposites with the GO content. The obtained results herein shows that the PVP/Cu/GO nanocomposites are successfully synthesized with attractive physiochemical properties suitable for the fabrication of organic electronic devices and photovoltaic devices.