Amorphous solid

Orthorhombic crystal system

Metallurgy

Materials science

Chromatography

Crystal structure

Band gap

Absorbance

Physics

Nanotechnology

Optics

Molybdenum trioxide

Doping

Thin film

Analytical Chemistry (journal)

Crystallography

Chemistry

Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy

Optoelectronics

Molybdenum

Optical Materials

Mn-doped MoO3 with different compositions in powder and thin film form have been prepared. The Orthorhombic (α-MoO3) crystal structure of pure MoO3 was revealed for (Mn)x(MoO3)1-x powdered samples, while the as-deposited films manifested an amorphous structure. FTIR spectra ensured that bonds are belonging to the vibrations of MoO bonds to Mo–O–Mo stretching vibrations at the optimum peaks, confirming the presence of a single phase of MoO3. For powdered samples, the intensity of reflection has reached the maximum value (up to ≈ 85%) for (Mn)x(MoO3)1-x sample with x = 0.02 at.%, whereas the minimum value of reflection was obtained for undoped and (Mn)x(MoO3)1-x sample with x = 0.10 at.%. For thin films, the intensity of reflectance varies from 10% to 25% for all the samples. The optical energy was found to vary from 3.20 eV to 3.33 eV for the powdered samples and from 3.11 to 3.66 for as-deposited thin films. The photocatalytic properties were studied for all powdered samples by determining the absorbance of Methylene blue, using UV source as a function of illumination time. The degradation efficiency had maximum value of 48.5% at x = 0.10 at.%. The electrical conductivity study exhibited that, the maximum electrical conductivity of 3.11 × 102 (Ω m)−1 was obtained for the sample x = 0.10 at.%. It was a good match with the high degradation efficiency, minimum value of absorption, and narrow bandgap that existed due to the formation of the intermediate state of Mn.

Mn-doped molybdenum trioxide for photocatalysis and solar cell applications