Facile one pot synthesis of PbS nanosheets and their characterization

Metal-sulfides semiconductor nanosheets are talented entrant to be applied in electro-optic devices. Hence, the synthesis of PbS nanosheets is achieved in the current work using a simple route. The synthesized nanosheets were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), FT-Raman, scanning electron microscope (SEM), UV-Visible, Photoluminescence (PL) and impedance spectroscopy techniques. XRD pattern and Raman spectrum confirms the formation of crystalline structure of PbS nanosheets. SEM study shows that the synthesized PbS is well defined nanosheets of < 5 nm thicknesses. The absorption band edge is found to be remarkably blue shifted in nanosheets compare to bulk. The energy gap is calculated to be 1.16 eV which is about 3 times superior than the bulk value (0.41 eV). The enhancement of band gap indicates the occurrence of quantum confinement effect in PbS nanosheets. A strong violet emission band at similar to 405 nm is observed in PL spectrum which is assigned to electrons transition from conduction-band edge to holes, ensnared at interstitial Pb2+ sites. (C) 2017 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.