Morphological features and optical properties of nanosized ZrO2 films prepared by sol-gel spin coating

Abstract

Abstract Homogeneous thin ZrO2 films were prepared by spin coating. The X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis revealed the presence of a mixture of monoclinic and tetragonal ZrO2 polycrystalline phases with nanosized crystallites. The samples were smooth and crack-free with a ganglia-like microstructure and had transmittance of about 80% in the UV-visible range. We established that adding polyethylene glycol (PEG) to the precursor affects the phase composition, morphology and optical properties of the films. The photoluminescence (PL) spectra of the samples revealed a broad violet emission. Some of the PEG-modified films exhibited about twice as intense PL emission as the non-modified films. Their emission bands were more complex, consisting of several additional peaks after deconvolution.