One-step synthesis of ZnO decorated CNT buckypaper composites and their optical and electrical properties

• One-step production of ZnO/CNT buckypapers using ZnO nanoparticles and tetrapods.
• Electrical properties dominated by CNTs.
• Luminescence dominated by the NBE recombination with almost no deep level emission.
• High optical quality of the produced structures.
• Good combination of the ZnO optical and CNT electrical properties.

ZnO/CNT composites were prepared using ZnO nanoparticles and tetrapods synthesized by the Laser Assisted Flow Deposition method. The co-operative behaviour between these two materials may give rise to the production of advanced functional materials with a wide range of applications in electronics and optoelectronics. Despite some degree of aggregation in the case of the nanoparticles, scanning electron microscopy images evidence that the produced ZnO structures are well dispersed in the CNT buckypapers. Independent of the ZnO morphology the samples resistivity was shown to be of the order of ∼10−1 Ω cm while in the case of the electron mobility, the composite with tetrapods reveals a lower value than the ones obtained for the remaining samples. Well-structured ZnO luminescence was observed mainly in ultraviolet highlighting the high optical quality of the produced structures. The temperature dependence of the luminescence reveals a distinct trend for the composites with ZnO tetrapods and ZnO nanoparticles.

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