Tetragonal Phase, Optical Properties, and Dielectric Spectroscopy of Zn Substituted Aluminum Copper Titanate Nanoparticles

Abstract The Al 0.8 Cu 0.2‐x Zn x TiO 3+δ ( x = 0.04, 0.08, 0.12, and 0.16) (ACZT) nanoparticles were synthesized via hydrothermal method. The structural behavior was investigated using the x‐ray diffractometer (XRD). The average crystallite size is increasing from 48.9 nm to 92.2 nm with increase in “x” from 0.04–0.16. The microstructure was examined at 200 nm, and 50 nm scale. The optical bandgap tuning of x = 0.04–0.16 took place from 2.893 eV to 2.259 eV by substituting the Zn content. The photocatalytic activity was observed for x = 0.04–0.16 samples. The room temperature dielectric, and impedance properties was investigated for x = 0.04–0.16 during the frequency range of 42 Hz to 8 MHz. The dielectric constant varies from 22.48–46.54 while the loss changes from 2.306–4.776 as a function of composition. Besides, the x = 0.16 is noticed as lossy dielectric material suitable for absorber applications. The mass loss of all samples was studied using thermogravimetric (TG) measurement. The x = 0.08 shows the high mass losses in the TG curves.