Optical, electrical and microstructural studies of monoclinic CuO nanostructures synthesized by a sol-gel route

We have reported on the synthesis of CuO nanostructures via a simple sol-gel approach with high yield at low cost by the reduction of aqueous solutions of Cu(NO3)(2) and Na2NO3. Synthesized nanostructures were characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive X-ray analysis (EDX), fluorescence spectroscopy, Raman scattering and UV-Vis-NIR spectroscopy. Structural studies revealed that the prepared CuO nanostructures were polycrystalline in nature with monoclinic structure. The crystallite size of CuO nanostructures was estimated to be similar to 10 nm using Debye-Scherrer's formula. The uniform and nanoregime grains were observed in SEM micrographs. The optical band gap value was estimated to be 1.2 eV using Tauc's plot. The Raman scattering investigations revealed A(g) and B-g mode peaks at 278 cm(-1), 332 cm(-1) and 618 cm(-1), respectively.