Copyright © 2015 American Scientific Publishers
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
Nanoscience and
Nanotechnology Letters
Vol. 7, 1–4, 2015
Cu-Doping Effect on Structural, Optical and Magnetic
Proper ties of Ce-Doped ZnO Nanoparticles
Huilian Liu
1 2
, Junlin Song
1 2
, Hongbo Li
3
,XinCheng
1 2
,MingGao
1 2
, Weijun Li
1 2
,
Xu Zhang
1 2
, Lianhua Fei
1 2
,YangLiu
1 2
, and Jinghai Yang
1 2 ∗
1
Institute of Condensed State Physics, Jilin Normal University, Siping 136000, People’s Republic of China
2
Key Laboratory of Functional Materials Physics and Chemistry (Jilin Normal University),
Ministry of Education, Siping 136000, People’s Republic of China
3
East China University of Science and Technology
Zn
099
Ce
001
O and Zn
098
Cu
001
Ce
001
O nanostructure powders have been successfully fabricated
by sol–gel method. The X-ray diffraction (XRD) results showed that the Zn
099
Ce
001
O and
Zn
098
Cu
001
Ce
001
O were single phase with the wurtzite structure of ZnO. The crystal quality of the
Zn
098
Cu
001
Ce
001
O was found to improve compared to that of the Zn
099
Ce
001
O samples. X-ray pho-
toelectron spectroscopy (XPS) revealed that the valence state of Ce didn’t change after Cu doping.
And the Cu ions doping induced an increase in the green emission was observed with incorporating
of Cu from the photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy results. Zn
099
Ce
001
O and Zn
098
Cu
001
Ce
001
O
nanostructure powders showed the obvious hysteresis loops at room temperature and the satura-
tion magnetization (Ms) increases with incorporating of Cu. These interesting magnetic properties
were explained based on the defect-related model for ferromagnetism.
Keywords: Nanoparticle, Ce, Cu Co-Doping, Photoluminescence, Sol–Gel Method.
1. INTRODUCTION
ZnO nanostructures have potential applications in solar
cells, electrodes, sensors, transparent UV p rotection
films, UV light emission, surface acoustic waves, and
magneto-optical devices.
1–10
Diluted magnetic semicon-
ductor (DMSs) have been extensively studied over the
last decade for their unique semiconducting and magnetic
properties. The ZnO based diluted magnetic semiconduc-
tor is one of the most widely studied systems to realize
high-temperature ferromagnetism according to the theo-
retical predictions, having attracted a great deal of atten-
tion in recent years.
11–13
Among all the TM dopants, Cu
has become the ultimate choice of many, owing to the
first-principles calculations based on the density functional
theory which revealed that Cu substitution with suitable
concentration favors a ferromagnetic ground state, and the
fact that neither metallic Cu nor its oxides (CuO and
Cu
2
O) are ferromagnetic at 300 K is advantageous, remov-
ing any possibility of ferromagnetism arising from the
presence of precipitates or secondary phases.
14–17
Then the
rare-earth metal Ce possesses unique optical and catalytic
characteristic, therefore Ce may be an ideal dopant and
∗
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
catalyst.
18 19
Recently, many researchers have tried to dope
other ions into the ZnO based DMSs to obtain two metal
ions co-doped ZnO in order to change their optical and
magnetic properties by introducing additional carriers.
20–22
Then quite a few studies on the optical and magnetic prop-
erties of rare-earth and transition metal ions co-doped ZnO
were done.
In this work, Ce doped and (Cu, Ce)-codoped ZnO pow-
ders were fabricated by sol–gel method, the effects of Cu
on the structural, optical and magn e tic proper ties of Ce-
doped ZnO powders were studied.
2. EXPERIMENTAL DETAILS
According to the Cerium concentration of 1 at.% and the
Copper concentration of 1 at.%, the Ce doped ZnO and
Cu, Ce-codoped ZnO nanostructure were prepared from
[Zn(NO
3
2
· 6H
2
O] (99.9%), [Cu(NO
3
2
· 3H
2
O] (99.9%)
and [ Ce(NO
3
3
· 6H
2
O] (99.9%). These compounds were
mixed and dissolved into citric acid (C
6
H
8
O
7
· H
2
O)
(99.5%) to get homogeneous solution while stirring for
2 h. The solution was dried at 80
C to obtain xerogel.
The drying of xerogel was completed at 130
C resulting
in a reticular substance which was ground to powder in an
agate mortar. Sintering of the powders was carried out at
Nanosci. Nanotechnol. Lett. 2015, Vol. 7, No. xx 1941-4900/2015/7/001/004 doi:10.1166/nnl.2015.1995 1