The characterization of ZnO nanoparticles by applying x-ray diffraction and different methods of peak profile analysis

Abstract

A zinc oxide sample was synthesized via the sol-gel (citrate route) method. This citrate sol-gel approach is typically used for synthesizing metal oxide powders. In this study, zinc acetate (Zn (CH3COO)2.2H2O) and citric acid were used as the Zn2+ source and the chelating agent, respectively. The nanostructure of the ZnO samples was scanned via X-ray diffractometry (XRD). In addition, Scanning Electron Microscope (JEOL Model JSM—IT 200) is used to investigate the nanoparticle size and elemental composition of the prepared ZnO samples. The microstructure analysis assumes the peak parameters of the XRD technique to evaluate the microstructure characteristics using width methods (the Williamson-Hall, Scherrer, and Rietveld methods (MAUD program)). These peak profile analysis methods are compared. The crystallite size, micro-strain and lattice parameters have been calculated. The effect of the zinc acetate to citric acid molar ratio on yield structure and purity was examined. The crystallite size and micro-strain values change differently with different concentrations of anhydrous citric acid. The crystallite size obtained by anhydrous citric acid was smaller than that obtained by monohydrated citric acid. Crystallite size and purity were affected by the amount of anhydrous citric acid used. The crystallite range of ZnO), a maximum crystallite size of about 129.3 nm is obtained at zero amount of anhydrous citric acid; followed by a fast decrease in crystallite size as the concentration of citric acid increases. A minimum crystallite size of about 44.4 nm is obtained at 0.5 g of anhydrous citric acid.