An investigation on high-temperature electrical transport properties of graphene-oxide nano-thinfilms

Abstract High-temperature electrical transport properties are investigated for graphene-oxide nano thinfilms. The graphene-oxide nanoparticles are synthesized by modified Hummers method and characterized by UV–vis, Raman and X-ray diffraction techniques. The surface morphology of graphene-oxide film is analyzed using scanning electron and atomic force microscopy. The experimental results on high-temperature electrical studies of thinfilms exhibit metallic behavior followed by three-dimensional variable range hopping mechanism. The current–voltage characteristics at various temperatures (from 293 K to 573 K) were investigated. The effect of high-temperature on the functional groups of graphene-oxide film is evidently examined using X-ray photoelectron, thermal gravimetric analysis and Fourier transform infra-red spectroscopy. Transistor characteristics were performed after heat treatment resulting ambipolar behavior with holes and electron mobility of 127 and 66.9 cm2 V−1 s−1 respectively. Our results are comparable to reduced graphene-oxide, indicating the advantage of our approach requires no further reduction to develop graphene-based transparent and conductive electrodes for dye-sensitized solar cells and ultra-capacitor applications.