Structural, optical, photoluminescence, and magnetic properties of Mo0.6−xTi0.3Zn0.1ErxO3 nanorods films fabricated by sol–gel/spin coating technique

Abstract

Er3+-incorporated Mo0.6−xTi0.3Zn0.1 nanorods thin films were prepared on glass substrates via controlled sol–gel method. The Mo, Zn, Ti, and Er solutions were prepared using ammonium dimolybdate, titanium isopropoxide, zinc acetate dehydrate, and erbium nitrate as the starting material. Ethylene glycol, monoethanolamine, and HCl acid are solvents and solution stabilizers in the sol–gel process. The effect of the Er3+ concentration (0 ≤ x ≤ 0.3 mol%) on the films structure, optical, photoluminescence, and magnetic properties of the nanorods films was investigated by XRD, SEM, Pl, and magnetic measurement. XRD analysis proved that the samples with Er doping = 0.0 and 0.1 consists of single-phase MoO3. By increasing erbium doping to 0.2 and 0.3, bi-phasic were obtained, one of them MoO3 and the other was related to Ti6O11. These results indicate that MoO3 (two-dimensional) can control the internal growth of the Mo0.6−xTi0.3Zn0.1ErxO3 film's structure as supported by SEM and FTIR results. The reflectance of doped films exhibits high values that are increasing with the Er ratio, which adapted an increase in the Eg values from 2.85 to 3.25 eV. The presence of Er3+ in the films is found to sense the photoluminescence process that reveals two emission lines at 1477 and 1543 nm for Er ions. Magnetization behavior for samples exhibits antiferromagnetic behavior with weak ferromagnetic and unsaturated characteristics, where the magnetization at the maximum field (Mmax) increases with increase in Er content.