Synthesis of crystalline mesoporous-assembled ZrO2 nanoparticles via a facile surfactant-aided sol–gel process and their photocatalytic dye degradation activity

Abstract

In this work, crystalline mesoporous-assembled ZrO2 nanoparticles were synthesized by a facile sol–gel process with the aid of a structure-directing surfactant. In order to investigate their physicochemical properties, the XRD, N2 adsorption–desorption, pore size distribution, UV–visible spectroscopy, SEM, and TEM analyses were performed. The characterization results revealed the high crystallinity and uniform particle size of the synthesized mesoporous-assembled ZrO2 nanoparticles. Their mesopore size distribution was very narrow and monomodal. Based on the characterization results, a possible mesopore formation model of the mesoporous-assembled ZrO2 nanoparticles was proposed. The photocatalytic Methyl Orange (MO) dye degradation performance of the synthesized mesoporous-assembled ZrO2 nanoparticles under UV light irradiation was also evaluated as compared with that of the commercial P-25 TiO2 powder. It was found that the synthesized mesoporous-assembled ZrO2 nanoparticles exhibited a comparatively higher MO degradation activity than the commercial P-25 TiO2 under identical optimum conditions.