Impacts of Low Energy Oxygen Irradiation on the Dielectric Properties of PVA/TiO2 Nanocomposite Films

In this work, the cast solutions manufacturing approach was applied to prepare a PVA/TiO₂ composite, which is made of titanium dioxide (TiO₂) and polyvinyl alcohol (PVA). The energy dispersive X-ray (EDX), atomic force microscope (AFM), and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) methods were employed to indicated the successful preparations of the composites. Moreover, the XRD and SEM methodologies were employed to investigate the impact of ion bombardment on the structural characteristics and surface morphology of the composite PVA/TiO₂. The prepared films were irradiated with oxygen beam at fluencies; 0.3 × 10¹⁷, 0.6 × 10¹⁷, and 0.9 × 10¹⁷ ions cm⁻². The ion beam increases the surface roughness of the PVA/TiO₂ from 17 nm for the un-bombarded up to 25 nm for highly irradiated one, as indicated and measured by AFM images. The dielectric behavior of the pure and bombarded films were measured at the frequency of 50 Hz–6 MHz. The results reveal that the dielectric properties of PVA/TiO₂ films were significantly modified by the oxygen beam bombardment. The results of the research pave the way for potential applications of irradiated PVA/TiO₂ nanocomposite sheets in various forms of energy storage as capacitors and batteries.