Investigation of the effect of annealing on the photoluminescence properties of ZnO nanoparticles, synthesized at low temperature

Abstract ZnO nanoparticles were synthesized by a simple chemical precipitation method at 0 °C and annealed in air at temperatures of 200, 400 and 600 °C. Effect of annealing temperature on the optical properties were characterized by the UV–Vis and photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy. The PL spectra of as prepared ZnO nanoparticles exhibits a narrow UV and a broad yellow emission peaks which are related to defect levels in the band gap. With the annealing temperature increasing, the intensity of yellow emission is strongly decreased, whereas the green emission is revealed. In addition, it was found that, there is a slight red shift in the UV absorption peak and a blue shift in the visible emission peak when the annealing temperature increases.