Annamma John

Electrical and optical properties of nanocrystalline RE–Ti–Nb–O6 (RE = Ce, Pr, Nd and Sm) electronic material

Nano-crystalline RETiNbO6 (RE = Ce, Pr, Nd and Sm) is successfully synthesized through the solution combustion technique. The XRD analysis revealed that the materials have orthorhombic aeschynite structure with space group Pnma. The particle size determined from XRD and TEM shows that the samples are nano-crystalline. Structure is confirmed by the analysis of FT-Raman, the fourier transform infrared spectra and surface morphology by SEM micrograph. The optical properties, dielectric characteristics at radio frequency range and complex impedance of the system are also studied. Percentage of rare earth in each compound, sintering temperature and density achieved are calculated. The UV–Vis spectra show that the materials can be used as a protective material from UV radiation due to high absorbance in that region. These compounds show strong emission in violet and green regions in the photoluminescence spectrum. The compounds are useful in communication systems due to low dielectric loss and high dielectric constant. The high ionic conductivity suggests that the material can be used as electrolyte in solid oxide fuel cells.