Abstract
The structural properties of nanocrystalline europium oxide (Eu2O3) thin films, produced via electrophoretic deposition (EPD), were investigated. We found that EPD from our Eu2O3 nanocrystal solutions yielded both translucent films, with uniform size and distribution of the microstructure, and opaque films, with marked anisotropy to the size and distribution of the constituents of the microstructure. The disparity in the film morphology arose from the initial temperature conditions of the nanocrystal solution. The translucent films, produced from pre-chilled (−25 °C) EPD solutions, were bimodal films, comprised of homogeneous, tightly packed, glassy nanocrystalline films interspersed with micron-sized nanocrystal aggregates. In contrast, the opaque films, produced from room temperature solutions, consisted of an irregularly distributed and shaped microstructure. The evolution of the microstructure was monitored for the chilled samples as a function of film thickness (deposition time) and juxtaposed with the resultant structure of the room temperature film. Optical microscopy and scanning electron microscopy were employed to characterize the films.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Leskelä M, Niinistö L (1992) Mater Chem Phys 31:7
Shea L, Mckittrick J, Lopez O, Sluzky E (1996) J Am Ceram Soc 79:3257
Meltzer RS, Hong KS (2000) Phys Rev B 61:3396
Ram S, Mohanty P (2002) J Mat Sci Lett 21:1127
Mohanty P, Ram S (2003) J Mat Chem 13:3021
Bazzi R, Flores MA, Louis C, Lebbou K, Zhang W, Dujardin C, Roux S, Mercier B, Ledoux G, Bernstein E, Perriat P, Tillement O (2004) Colloid Interf Sci 273:191
Carnall T, Fields PR, Rajnak KJ (1968) J Chem Phys 49:4450
Eilers H, Tissue BM (1996) Chem Phys Lett 251:74
Bihari B, Eilers H, Tissue BM (1997) J Lumin 75:1
Wakefield G, Heron HA, Dobson PJ, Hutchinson JL (1999) J Colloid Interf Sci 215:179
Feng J, Shan G, Maquieira A, Koivunen ME, Guo B, Hammock BD, Kennedy IM (2003) Anal Chem 75:5288
Härmä H, Soukka T, Lövgren T (2001) Clin Chem 47:561
Raue R, Vink AT, Welker T (1989) Philips Tech Rev 44:225
Jiao H, Wang J, Liao F, Tian S, Jing X (2004) J Electrochem Soc 151:H49
Mochizuki S, Nakanishi T, Suzuki Y, Ishi K (2001) Appl Phys Lett 79:3785
Ono H, Kusumata T (2001) Appl Phys Lett 78:1832
Singh MP, Shivashankar SA (2005) J Cryst Grow 276:148
Wong EM, Searson PC (1999) Appl Phys Lett 74:2939
Islam MA, Herman IP (2002) Appl Phys Lett 80:823
Maenosono S, Okubo T, Yamaguchi Y (2003) J Nano Res 5:5
Islam MA, Xia Y, Telesca Jr DA, Steigerwald ML, Herman IP (2004) Chem Mater 16:49
Murray CB (1995) Synthesis and characterization of II–VI quantum dots and their assembly into 3D quantum dot superlattices. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, PhD thesis, 164pp
Kagan CR, Murray CB, Bawendi MG (1996) Phys Rev B 54:8633
Murray CB, Kagan CR, Bawendi MG (2000) Annu Rev Mater Sci 30:545
Gonzales-Cuenca M, Maarten Biesheuvel P, Verweij H (2000) AIChE J 46:626
Preston MA, Kornbrekke R, White LR (2005) Langmuir 21:9832
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Sandra Rosenthal and Dmitry Koktysh for fruitful discussions and Enrique Jackson for assistance with the optical microscopy images. This research is supported in part by Vanderbilt Institute for Nanoscale Science and Engineering (VINSE).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Mahajan, S.V., Kavich, D.W., Redigolo, M.L. et al. Structural properties of electrophoretically deposited europium oxide nanocrystalline thin films. J Mater Sci 41, 8160–8165 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-006-0420-1
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-006-0420-1