Structural, morphological and optical properties of Ba1-xCuxTiO3 (X = 0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8) nanoparticles synthesizedby hydrothermal method

A series of Ba1-xCuxTiO3 (X = 0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8) nanoparticles were synthesized via the hydrothermal technique. The diffraction study confirms the cubic phase formation of barium copper titanate ceramics. The high concentration of copper addition (x = 0.8) manifests that the crystal structure undergoes transformation from cubic to mixed phases (cubic and copper titanate). The X-ray density (Dx) and bulk densities (Db) are decreasing with copper content. The surface morphology was investigated using field emission scanning and transmission electron microscopes (FESEM & TEM). The results provide the non-uniform grain structure. The average grain size is found to be varying between 57 and 181 nm. The TEM study shows the platelet like nanoparticles for x = 0.8 and similar observations were made from FESEM. The presence of metal oxide bonds (M-O) were evaluated from Fourier transform infrared spectra. The UV-Visible spectra attribute the optical band gap energy ranging from 1.56 to 1.46 eV.