Structural and thermal properties of nickel oxide nanoparticles doped cadmium zinc borate glasses: preparation and characterization

Nickel-doped cadmium zinc borate glass of various nickel oxide content was prepared as xNiO-20ZnO-60B(2)O(3)-(20-x) CdO (0 <= x <= 5 mol %), by the melt quenching method based on nano metal oxides. Both the zinc oxide nanoparticles (ZnO NPs) and cadmium oxide nanoparticles (CdO NPs) were prepared via the solution-combustion technique. Nickel oxide nanoparticles (NiO NPs) was synthesized by the combustion of Ni(OH)(2) and boron oxide nanoparticles (B2O3 NPs)was synthesized by the solid-state reaction method. The amorphous nature of these types of glass was confirmed using X-ray diffraction analysis (XRD). The morphology of nano-metal oxides was investigated via the scanning electron microscope (SEM). SEM imaging showed that the NiO NPs had a semi-spherical morphology, and that their average particle size was 22.17 nm. The Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy's (FTIR) spectral analysis was used to identify the structural units of these types of glass via deconvolution, in terms of multi-Gaussian fitting. Results proved that Ni4+ plays an important role and a key to improve the formation of the BO4 network units. Finally, the high thermal stability and glass transition temperature of the prepared glass samples were increased by increasing the loading of NiO NPs from 0.0 mol % - 5.07k = mol % and this was established by using DTA.