Structural and Optical Properties of Polypyrrole/NiO Doped Nanocomposites

This study reports the synthesis of polypyrrole/NiO doped nanocomposites (NCs) as a shielding pigment in organic coatings. Polypyrrole/NiO doped NCs were prepared by in-situ chemical oxidative polymerization of pyrrole monomer. Here dopant NiO nanoparticles (NPs) were synthesized by solution combustion method using Aloe vera gel as fuel with ammonium per sulphate (APS) as oxidant. Different concentrations of NiO (10-50 wt%) NPs were incorporated into the polypyrrole. The synthesized nanocomposites were characterized by means of powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM). The size of the NPs were calculated by Scherer method, and found to be around 20 nm. TEM results are in consistent with the XRD results. The morphology of the obtained composites shows the porous and agglomerated particles which are due to large amount of gas evolution during NPs synthesis by solution combustion method and optical properties were studied.