Investigations of thermal, structural, optical, morphological and magnetic properties of chemical precipitation synthesized NiO nanoparticles for optoelectronic applications

In the current research, the chemical precipitation technique has been successfully used to synthesize NiO nanoparticles with different NaOH concentrations (0.2, 0.4, and 0.6 M). TGA-DSC is used to assess the thermal stability of NiO nanoparticles produced using the chemical precipitation process. Three different produced cubic structured NiO nanomaterials stood identified from the XRD patterns. The Scherrer formula indicates that the average crystalline sizes are 16.37, 14.07, and 11.83 nm, in that order. The 2.32 eV (N1) value for the optical band gap was identified. PL spectra at room temperature confirmed the optical results obtained from UV-Vis spectroscopy. The spherical structure of the nanoscale outcome was revealed by TEM. According to the HRTEM image, the d-spacing value is about 0.24 nm, which matches the (111) plane of cubic NiO. Magnetic studies (VSM) explored weak ferromagnetic behaviour and exhibited the typical weak ferromagnetic curve. Saturation magnetization and coercivity values of the N2 and N3 samples are significantly greater than those of the N1 sample. This finding indicates that these NiO nanoparticles have potential applications in optoelectronics, photocatalysis and magnetic fields.