Synthesis and Characterization of ZnO-decorated GO Nanocomposite Material with Different ZnO Loading through Sol-gel Method

Teow Yeit Haan,Abdul Wahab Mohammad,Nurul ‘Adilah Rosnan

doi:10.17576/jkukm-2018-30(2)-15

Abstract

This work aimed is to synthesis a well dispersed zinc oxide (ZnO) nanoparticles (NPs) decorated on graphene oxide (GO) nanosheet with a practical way by using sol-gel technique. Zinc acetate dehydrate (Zn(CH3COO) 2·2H2O) was used as precursor of ZnO and absolute ethanol as solvent. 1 weight percent (wt%), 5 wt%, 10 wt%, and 20 wt% of ZnO was decorated on GO nanosheet. A series of analysis was carried out to characterize the synthesized ZnO-decorated GO nanocomposite material. The results of XRD analysis show some long area of peak at 25° to 80° allocate for ZnO in the ZnO-decorated GO nanocomposite material. By performing zeta potential analysis, the findings show that there was increment of negative surface charge on ZnO-decorated GO nanocomposite material. The experiment result also found that the hydrodynamic particle size of ZnO-decorated GO nanocomposite material become larger when high ZnO loaded. FESEM micrographs demonstrated that spherical-shaped of ZnO NPs appeared on the GO nanosheet with further proved by EDX where the content of ZnO-decorated GO nanocomposite material was composed by 71.3 wt% of C, 17 wt% of O, and additional element of 11.7 wt% of Zn. Thus, it can summarize that the synthesized ZnO-decorated GO nanocomposite material was high in purity. The findings in this study proved that ZnO NPs loading in ZnO-decorated GO nanocomposite material were successfully synthesized by sol-gel method. A ZnO-decorated GO nanocomposite material with layering ZnO NPs on GO nanosheet was produced.

Highlights

zinc oxide (ZnO)-decorated graphene oxide (GO) nanocomposite material was successfully synthesized via sol-gel method
The inclusion effect of difference weight percent of ZnO loading in ZnO-decorated GO nanocomposite material on crystallite phase, hydrodynamic particle size, and zeta potential were investigated
It was found that the ZnO-decorated GO nanocomposite material was composed of spherical-like ZnO NPs anchored on GO sheet

Summary

Introduction

There are ZnO NPs has emerged as one of the highly promising metal NPs used in many applications, including gas sensor, protective coatings, electro photography, solar cells (Hasnidawani et al 2016), healthcare, optics, ultraviolet, and blue light emitting diodes, and in the evolution of membrane area, due to their excellent properties of antimicrobial, anticorrosive, thermal, and mechanical stability (Fan & Lu 2005; Vaseem et al 2010; Wang et al 2002), high catalytic activity, strong adsorption capacity, low toxicity, and environmental friendly feature (Vaseem et al 2010).In membrane technology area, incorporation of ZnO NPs into polymer matrix has proven could improve the implementation of membrane such as water flux, rejection capability, and antifouling property (Liang et al 2012; Shen et al 2012; Zhao et al 2015). GO formed from oxidation of graphite were fascinating carbon material that carried hydroxyl and epoxies functional groups on their basal planes, in addition carbonyl and carboxyl groups located at the sheet edges (Qin et al 2014). These functional groups of GO nanosheet are essential in forming hybrid nanostructures with various kinds of NPs such as silver (Ag), silicon dioxide (SiO2), and titanium dioxide (TiO2) (Ng et al 2013)

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Conclusion