Radiation Induced Synthesis of In₂O₃Nanoparticles - Part II: Synthesis of In₂O₃ Nanoparticles by Thermal Decomposition of Un-irradiated and γ-irradiated Indium Acetylacetonate

Abstract

Pure cubic phase, In₂O₃ nanoparticles with porous structure were synthesized by solid state thermal oxidation of un-irradiated and γ-irradiated indium acetyl acetonate in presence and absence of sodium dodecyl sulphate as surfactant. The as- synthesized In₂O₃nanoparticles were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), fourier transformation infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transition electron microscopy (TEM) and thermogravimetry (TG). The shapes and morphologies of as- synthesized In₂O₃nanoparticles were highly affected by γ-irradiation of indium acetyl acetonate precursor and by addition of sodium dodecyl sulphate as surfactant. Calcination of un-irradiated indium acetyl acetonate precursor to 4 hours of 600 °C leads to the formation of spherical- shaped accumulative and merged In₂O₃ nanoparticles with porous structure, whereas irregular porous architectures composed of pure In₂O₃nanoparticles were obtained by using γ-irradiated indium acetylacetonate precursor. The as- prepared In₂O₃ nanoproducts exhibit photoluminescence emission (PL) property and display thermal stability in a wide range of temperature (25-800 °C) which suggest possible applications in nanoscale optoelectronic devices.

Keywords:
indium acetylacetonate; thermal decomposition; γ-irradiation; indium oxide nanoparticles