Investigation of chemical bonding and electronic network of rGO/PANI/PVA electrospun nanofiber

Abstract

Reduced graphene oxide-reinforced polyaniline and poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA/PANI/rGO) nanofibers were synthesized by electrospinning method with different rGO content varying from 1 to 5wt%. The PVA/PANI/rGO nanofibers were characterized by SEM, FTIR, Raman, XPS and UV–visible spectroscopy to investigate the morphology, vibrational bonding, elemental composition and optical properties, respectively. The XRD results reveal the broad peak at 2θ = 25° corresponding to (002) for rGO and three peaks at 2θ = 14°, 20° and 25° corresponding to (011), (020) and (200), respectively for PANI. The FTIR signatures at 1088, 1245, 1359, 1411, 1717, 2930 and 3305 cm−1 correspond to ν-(C–O), ν-(N–H), ν-(C–OH), ν-(C=O), ν-(C–H) and ν-(O–H), respectively. The optical bandgap of PVA/PANI/rGO nanofibers was decreased from 4.20 to 4.07 eV as the rGO wt% increased. The structural and electronic network of carbon was analyzed by semiempirical Gaussian peaks to predict various binding energy of core orbital binding energy spectra in PVA/PANI/rGO nanofibers.