Optical, thermal and electrical characterization of PEO/CMC incorporated with ZnO/TiO2 NPs for advanced flexible optoelectronic technologies

Abstract

The optical, thermal, and electrical properties of a blend of polyethylene oxide (PEO) and carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) are examined in the current work in relation to the effects of zinc oxide (ZnO) and titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanoparticles. To create hybrid ZnO/TiO2 NPs nanocomposites with a PEO/CMC matrix, the solution casting method was utilized. The XRD study results demonstrate that the nanocomposite films' crystallinity decreases with increasing ZnO/TiO2 NP concentrations. FT-IR spectra reveal the interaction between metal oxide NPs and the PEO/CMC composite. UV/Vis analytical spectroscopy was used to calculate the optical properties, such as the energy gap (Eg), refractive index (n), and the number of carbon atoms (M). The inclusion of 7 wt%ZnO/TiO2 NPs decreased the polymer matrix's allowed direct energy gap from 3.68 to 2.81 eV. The AC conductivity results show that the σdc of the nanocomposite samples decreases with increasing ZnO/TiO2 NPs concentrations. The σdc of the final sample (PEO/CMC@7 wt% ZnO/TiO2) was 5.18 × 10−7Scm−1. According to exponential factor (S) results, the dominates conduction mechanism is correlated barrier hopping (CBH) with non-Debye relaxation processes. Space charge polarization was demonstrated by large ε′ values in the low-frequency dielectric properties, whereas an increase in energy loss may be related with a larger εʹ' value in the composite samples. These results prove that these nanocomposites can be used in a variety of energy-related devices, such as flexible capacitors, and energy storage systems.