Bimetallic CoO y –CuO x Particles in Polyfuran Films, Electromagnetic Absorption and Electric Conductivity

The influence of CoOy–CuOx bimetallic particles on the physical and electrical properties of polyfuran (PFu) films to be potentially applied in the absorption of electromagnetic energy in photo-stimulated processes is analyzed in this work. The synthesis of particles was done by sol–gel obtaining spherical profiles with mean size in the 40–120 nm interval and with atomic ratio Cu/Co = 0.57. The synthesis of PFu was done by glow discharge plasmas at 13.56 MHz. The film thickness was obtained in the 10–90 µm interval. Chemical analyses of the polymeric films showed furan groups and others as C–O, C=O and ≈C≈, which can be originated in oxidized and/or fragmented furan rings. The combination of polymer films and metallic particles was done by cryo-lyophilization with ethanol to produce partial solubilization of the polymer to embed the polymeric particles with a mass ratio PFu/CoOy–CuOx = 10. The hybrid composites showed chemical interaction between PFu and the bimetallic particles, suggesting the formation of a new material, which absorbed electromagnetic energy in the visible wavelength interval with activation energy of 2.9 eV, calculated with the Arrhenius equation, with an additive absorption of both, polymeric and metallic fractions. No absorption was detected in the UV region. The electric conductivity was calculated in the 20–100 °C interval, finding that the transference of charges of the hybrid compounds is like that of PFu in magnitude.