Effect of annealing temperature on VO2(M)/ITO film nanomaterials for thermochromic smart windows application and study its contact angle

Metastable phase VO2(B) film coated ITO glass was prepared using cyclic potentiometric device utilizing VOSO4 and H2SO4 solution. The optimum conditions for the deposition of the nanostructured VO2(B) film were determined using cathodic peak current density (Ipc) values. Ipc values increase with increasing both VOSO4 and H2SO4 concentrations and then decrease with further increasing the concentrations. Also, monoclinic phase VO2(M)/ITO film was prepared from VO2(B)/ITO film under the effect of annealing temperatures from 550°C to 750°C. Different analyses have been carried out to confirm the chemical, morphological, and crystal structure of the nanostructured VO2(M)/ITO film. From the XRD analysis, the crystallinity increases with the increasing of annealing temperature from 550°C to 750°C. The optical transmittance spectrum was ∼97% for the film annealed at 650°C. Also, the critical thermochromic temperature (Tc) of the optimized film was ∼47.5°C that measured using cooling and heating modes. Finally, the wettability of the VO2(M)/ITO film at different annealing temperature (550°C to 750°C) was studied, in which the contact angle increases from 81 deg to 92 deg with increasing annealing temperatures from 550°C to 750°C, respectively.