Structural and Optical Properties Investigation of Graphene Oxide coated ZnO nanorods for Enhanced Photocatalytic Effect

Abstract

The effect of Graphene Oxide coating on the structural and optical properties of Zinc Oxide Nanorods (ZnO NRs) is investigated in this paper. The hydrothermal method was used to synthesize ZnO NRs and the drop-coating method was implemented to synthesize Graphene Oxide coated Zinc Oxide Nanorods (ZnO NRs/GO) on a glass substrate. Field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), Energy Dispersive Analyzer X-Ray (EDX), Raman, and UV-Visible spectroscopies were used to investigate the materials' morphological, structural, and optical properties. The synthesis of ZnO NRs/GO has been confirmed by SEM analysis. The hybridization of ZnO NRs and GO was verified by Raman analysis and EDX results. The optical bandgap of ZnO NRs/GO is estimated to be (3.147 eV), which is lower compared to the uncoated ZnO NRs (3.212 eV), as determined from the analysis of UV absorbance spectra. Our findings show that the hybridization of ZnO NRs with GO leads to lowering the nanocomposite's bandgap which may improve photocatalytic efficiency compared to uncoated ZnO NRs.