Acrylic polymer/cement nanocomposites in dark and light colors have been developed for coating floors and swimming pools. This work aims to emphasize the effect of cement filling on the mechanical parameters, thermal stability, and wettability of acrylic polymer. The preparation was carried out using the casting method from acrylic polymer coating solution, which was added to cement nanoparticles (65 nm) with weight concentrations of (0, 1, 2, 4, and 8 wt%) to achieve highquality specifications and good adhesion. Maximum impact strength and Hardness shore A were observed at cement ratios of 2 wt% and 4 wt%, respectively. Changing the filling ratio has a significant effect on the strain of the nanocomposites. The contact angle was increased as the concentration of additives and cement increased, indicating that the synthesized coating is not hydrophilic and does not allow water permeability through it. The results show that the acrylic polymer/cement with a cement ratio of 8 wt% is the best nanocomposite for high-efficiency waterproofing.

Chalcogenide glasses of GexSe100-x (x=10, 15, 20, 25 and 30 at.%) glasses were prepared by vacuum melting. An empirical relation between the glass transition temperature (Tg) and is proposed by applying the Gibbs-Di Marzio equation for the Tg of a crosslinked polymer as a function of cross-linked density. We found a good agreement with the experimental result of Tg for GexSe100-x glasses. Several parameters such as mean atomic volume density, compactness, and free volume percentage which are more sensitive to the structure network changes were calculated. Their variation is discussed in connection with the proposed structural model. The variation of the molar volume and Tg with indicates the coexistence of topological and chemical ordering effects. With the structural modification, the number of lone-pair decreases, and the covalent coupling of the structural network increases with increasing Ge content, due to the increases in the crosslinked between Ge and Se bridge.

The influences of annealing temperature (473–573 K) on the crystal structure, linear/nonlinear optical parameters, and electrical characteristics of 80 nm thick indium-doped tin oxide (ITO) thin films are investigated. Thermal annealing induces the crystal structure in the ITO. As-prepared and annealed ITO have various morphologies depending on the annealing temperature, such as nanoplates and dendritic and spherical nanoparticles. As the substrate temperature increased up to 370 K, the electrical resistivity and sheet resistance of as-prepared ITO decreased dramatically and then slightly decreased as the substrate temperature further increased. The electrical conductivity and activation energy for the various processes were estimated. The reflectance (R) and transmittance (T) data are used to calculate the linear/nonlinear optical constants and parameters. The optical bandgap increased from 3.18 to 3.8 eV as the annealing temperature increased from room temperature to 573 K. Crystallinity is improved due to the annealing and hence an enhancement in the optical energy bandgap is achieved. Meanwhile, high-temperature annealing reversibly affected the optical bandgap energy of ITO thin films via reduction and oxidation reactions. Thermal annealing of ITO films improves crystal structure, visual transparency, and electrical conductivity, making it the preferred material for optoelectronic devices and solar cells.

In this work, we employed the casting procedure to synthesize polymer hybrids from epoxy with acrylic polymer coating with nanoclay. The investigated polymer hybrid was composed of 80% epoxy resin, 17% acrylic polymer solution, and 3% nanoclay. The polymer hybrid samples were ranged in thickness from 1 to 3 mm. The infuence of the sample’s thickness on thermal stability, thermal conductivity, and mechanical properties, as well as the constant angle of polymer hybrids were examined. The structural investigation revealed that the loaded nanocaly is crystalline with an average crystal size of 56 nm inside the amorphous polymer matrix. Also, it consistently dispersed throughout the epoxy matrix, showing that the tiny nanoparticles were meant to agglomerate with one another. The maximum thermal stability was found in polymer hybrids with a thickness of 2 mm, and the contact angle was closed to 90° for polymer hybrids with a thickness of 1.5 mm. The hardness values were remained constant around 73±1 and were unafected by sample’s thickness. Meanwhile, increasing the polymer hybrid's thickness slightly improves the impact and fexural strength values. The anticipated value of the wear rate was slightly changed while increasing with applied force. As the thickness of the synthesized polymer hybrids was rose from 1 to 3 mm, the thermal conductivity was fell from 0.47 to 0.32 W/m K. The synthesized hybrid epoxy and acrylic polymer coating/nanoclay was exhibit signifcant thermal and mechanical stability, as well as hydrophobicity, and hence may be employed for foor painting and waterproofng applications.

The efect of Ag content on the linear and nonlinear optical characteristics of thermal evaporated Se90−xTe10Agx thin flms, 100 nm thick, (where x=0, 2, 4, 6, and 8 at.%) has been examined. The optical measurements were reviewed in the wavelength range of 390–2500 nm based on the transmittance and refectance data, and the amorphous state of the as-prepared thin flm was confrmed by X-ray difraction. The absorption coefcient, extinction coefcient, bandgap, optical density, optical conductivity, dissipation factor, and other optical properties were examined and discussed. For all of the samples, the extinction coefcient of Se90−xTe10Agx declines as the wavelength and Ag concentration rise, whereas the absorption coeffcient increases linearly with incident photon energy. Furthermore, the optical bandgap and the width of localized states alter in the exact opposite direction, which is consistent with previously reported fndings. The decrease in the optical band gap as Ag concentration increases could be attributable to an increase in the amount of disorder in the materials and the density of defect states. Other critical optoelectronic characteristics are also determined, and they are found to be infuenced by the Ag ratio and photon wavelength. These materials may be ideal for optical memory applications due to their high absorption coefcient and compositional dependence of absorption.

Nickel oxide (NiO) nanoparticles were formed using the chemical precipitation method. The efect of the calcination process on the structural parameters, optical bandgap, and photocatalytic performance was investigated. The structural characteristics were carried out using X-ray difraction (XRD), Fourier transforms infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), and scanning electron microscope (SEM). The XRD analysis reveals that the formed NiO crystallized in an fcc crystal structure and the calcination process infuences the crystallite size, microstrain, dislocation density, and average surface area. For example, the smallest and largest particle sizes (19.13 nm and 27.63 nm) were achieved for the samples prepared at 800 °C for 4 h and 900 °C for 2 h, respectively. Based on the difuse refectance spectroscopy analysis, the energy bandgap has the lowest values (3.33 eV) for the prepared NiO that calcinated at 800 °C for 2 h compared with other samples. The formation of a Ni–O stretching vibration mode is revealed by FTIR, and the broadness of the absorption band confrms that the NiO samples are nanocrystals. The morphology of the prepared NiO reveals the formation of spherical nanoparticles for NiO calcinated at 700 °C, while dodecahedron-like shapes were observed for NiO calcinated at 800 and 900 °C. The photocatalytic performance of NiO nanoparticles as catalysts for the degradation of indigo carmine dye was investigated under ultraviolet–visible irradiation up to 3 h. The best degradation efciency was found to be 76% for NiO calcinated at 800 °C for 4 h, which belonged to the smallest crystallite size of 19.13 nm, and the highest surface area of 47.02 m2 g−1. The superior and excellent performance of this sample compared to other samples was confrmed by achieving the highest reaction rate constant (4.51× 10−3 min−1). The proposed photodegradation mechanism shows the importance of increasing the time required for the recombination process between the positive holes and the excited electrons, which is the best possible when using the optimum photocatalyst sample that was prepared at 800 °C for 4 h.

The effects of the Al ratio on the morphological and structural parameters, thermal stability, surface area, optical band gap, and methane (CH4) gas–sensing of AlxZn1-xO nanoparticles were investigated. The homogeneous precipitation method was used to prepare AlxZn1-xO nanoparticles (x = 0, 0.5, 1, 2, and 4 at.%) and their compositions were revealed by EDX mapping. The hexagonal crystal structure of ZnO was obtained by annealing at 600 ◦C and wasn’t affected by the Al ratio. The crystallite/particle size was decreased while dislocation density and stacking fault were increased as Al content increased. The Al ratio controls the morphology of AlxZn1-xO e.g., rod-like, and nano-sheet shapes were observed for higher Al ratios. UV–visible absorption spectroscopy was utilized to investigate the optical absorbance and optical band gap (Eg), e.g., increasing the Al content increased Eg from 3.38 eV (for ZnO) up to 5.8 eV for Al0.04Zn0.96O. Al-doped ZnO has a considerable impact on both the surface area and the thermal stability of ZnO. The maximum surface area (189.72 m2 /g) was achieved for the Al0.005Zn0.995O. The sensing parameters as a function of operating temperature and Al doping ratio have been thoroughly tested. The Al0.005Zn0.995O revealed the best sensing performance toward CH4 gas.

In this article, the casting method was used to prepare poly(methyl methacrylate)/hydroxyapatite (PMMA/HA) nanocomposite flms incorporated with diferent contents (0.5, 1, and 1.5 wt%) of graphene nanoplatelets (Gnp). The chemical properties and surface morphology of the PMMA/HA blend and PMMA/HA/Gnp nanocomposite were characterized using FTIR, and SEM analysis. Besides, the thermal conductivity, dielectric and electrical properties at (1–107 Hz) of the PMMA/HA blend and PMMA/HA/Gnp composites were investigated. The structural analysis showed that the synthesized composites had a low agglomerated state, with multiple wrinkles of graphene fakes in the PMMA/HA blend. The thermal conductivity was improved by more than 35-fold its value for pure PMMA. The AC and DC electrical conductivities of PMMA/HA/Gnp composites were enhanced with increasing the amount of Gnp and the estimated exponent (s) being between 1.25 and 1.3. The values of the real part (ɛ′) and imaginary part (ε′′) of the dielectric constant as well as electrical impedance depend on the Gnp ratio. The value of ɛ′ was reduced at the lower frequency (< 105  Hz) and became constant at the higher frequency which attributed to the relaxation time. The values of ε″ are small at low frequencies and increase with increased frequency due to the electronic polarization efects as well as to the dipoles not beginning to follow the feld variation at higher frequencies. The increase in the dielectric loss, tan(δ), with an increase in Gnp content, to 0.5 wt%, due to the interfacial polarization mechanism occurred in the composite’s flms corresponding to frequencies.

The direct impregnation approach is used to synthesize nickel dimethylglyoxime (NDG) on γ-alumina (γ-Al2O3) composites to be used as a catalyst. The structural, thermal, and magnetic characteristics of γ-Al2O3, NDG, and NDG/γ-Al2O3 composites are investigated and their photocatalytic performance towards methylene blue (MB) and methyl orange (MO) is examined. The fnding supports the use of NDG over γ-Al2O3 as catalysts, besides their enhanced thermal stability. The scanning electron microscope (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) demonstrate that the catalyst particles are dispersed uniformly, indicating that the Ni microcrystalline or Ni nanoparticles on γ-Al2O3 are most likely distributed in a single phase and/or in a homogenous route. X-ray difraction (XRD) results together with the results of SEM and TEM indicated that NDG/γ-Al2O3 nanocomposite catalysts can be prepared efectively by impingement approach. The average crystallite size of γ-Al2O3 is 6 nm, whereas the average crystallite size of NDG/γ-Al2O3 composites is 10 nm. Both γ-Al2O3 and NDG/γAl2O3 composites have a weakly diamagnetic response, whereas NDG exhibits poor ferromagnetism response. The calculated values for the photodegradation efciency, after UV–visible irradiation for 130 min, towards MO dye employing γ-Al2O3, NDG, and NDG/γ-Al2O3 composites as a catalyst are 74.2, 36.7, and 61.7%, respectively, whereas their values towards MB dye are 17.8, 5.3, and 19.1%, respectively. Furthermore, when NDG was combined with γ-Al2O3 to form NDG/γ-Al2O3 composites, the degradation performance was signifcantly improved and could be suitable for the degradation of other dyes.

Functionalizing organic–inorganic materials for use in packaging technologies, such as polymers wrapped in thin metal, has proven to be one of the more successful strategies. In this study, the direct current (DC) sputtering technique under a vacuum of 3× 10−5 Torr was used to deposit silver (Ag) flms of thicknesses of 100 and 300 nm on poly (methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) polymer. The structural, optical, antibacterial activity, and wettability properties of Ag/PMMA were carried out using X-ray difraction (XRD), Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), feld emission scanning electron microscope (FE-SEM), atomic force microscopy (AFM), UV spectrophotometer, and contact angle. The cubic crystal structure phase of Ag was confrmed by the XRD. The Ag coating layer has consistent nanomorphology, according to AFM, and the PMMA substrate surface was well coated with Ag nanoparticles. As the Ag flm thickness rose, the optical band gap values of Ag/PMMA slightly increased. In addition, it has been found that these optical characteristics such as extension coefcient, optical density, and optical surface resistance essentially depend on the thickness of the Ag layers. Both samples of pure PMMA and Ag/PMMA polymers show no activity against E. coli. In the meantime, S. aureus activity is detected in the Ag/PMMA samples, and the antibacterial activity is slightly infuenced by the Ag thickness. The contact angle rose as the Ag flm thickness grew over the PMMA, resulting in a decrease in the wettability of the liquid which is required for food packaging technology.