Synthesis and characterization of novel Cu2O/PVDF nanocomposites for flexible ferroelectric organic electronic memory devices

Abstract

Copper oxide nanoparticles loaded Poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF) nanocomposites, at concentrations from 1 to 9 wt%, were developed by casting technique. The effect of the Cu2O nanoparticles on the structure, thermal, mechanical and dielectric properties of the PVDF were inspected. The scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) revealed the well dispersion of the Cu2O nanoparticles into the PVDF matrix up to 5 wt%. The X-ray diffraction (XRD) patterns and the infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) measurements implied that the inclusion of the Cu2O nanoparticles into the PVDF matrix leads to a transform of the non-polar semi-crystalline α-phase of the neat PVDF to highly crystallized polar β-phase. Moreover, an increase of the thermal stability and crystallinity of the PVDF after the incorporation of the Cu2O nanoparticles was achieved. The Cu2O/PVDF nanocomposites exhibited excellent cyclic mechanical property compared to the neat PVDF. The introduction of 5 wt% Cu2O nanoparticles into the PVDF composites resulted in remarkable increase of the dielectric constant by 13 times while the dielectric loss was very low. A device based on Al/5 wt% Cu2O doped PVDF/Pt structure is developed. This device shows ferroelectric hysteresis with butterfly like shape and exhibited remanent polarization of 11.2 μC/cm2 with coercive field of 49 MV/m. These superior properties enable the developed Cu2O/PVDF nanocomposite films to be a potential candidate in the field of ferroelectric organic electronic memory devices.