Preparation of strontium doped mesoporous ZnO nanoparticles to investigate their dye degradation efficiency

Abstract

Mesoporous strontium doped ZnO nanoparticles are synthesized as photocatalyst by using zinc nitrate hexahydrate, surfactant P123, strontium nitrate hexahydrate via the hydrothermal process. X-ray diffraction (XRD), UV-visible spectroscopy (UV), Fourier transform infrared (FTIR), Photoluminescence (PL), Energy-dispersive x-ray (EDX), Scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) characterizations are used for the analysis of all the samples. XRD spectra disclose the disparity in the crystal size 14.98 to 22.74 nm. The study of UV spectroscopy revealed the energy bandgap difference between 3.3–2.92 eV. PL spectroscopy shows the effect of doping on the electron-hole recombination rate of the sample. FTIR analysis has utilized to determine the functional groups such as –OH, C=O=C, and –C–O present in the sample. EDX spectra show the elemental compositions of the sample. SEM images show the agglomerated morphology and TEM images show the different shape morphology of the sample. BET analysis shows the occurrence of 39.9 m2 g−1 surface area with mesoporous morphology. The effect of the increasing percentage of strontium on the photocatalytic capability of ZnO is checked against methylene blue and congo red dyes with 75% and 80% degradation.