Micro‐structural Analysis and Photocatalytic Properties of Green Synthesized t‐ZrO2 Nanoparticles. Issue 4 (25th January 2022) - Sikdar, Suranjan
Abstract: Tetragonal zirconia (t‐ZrO2 ) nanoparticles (NPs) were successfully synthesized by a green method using β‐cyclodextrin as stabilizer. The structural characterization of the prepared nanoparticles was done by X‐ray diffraction (XRD).The tetragonal crystalline structure of ZrO2 NPs was confirmed by XRD analysis. We employed the Rietveld method to refine the XRD data and the refinement result leads to specify the tetragonal phase of ZrO2 NPs with space group P 42/n m c. The FTIR spectrum gives the information about the presence of Zr−O bonding at 501 cm −1 . Particle size and morphological properties were demonstrated by Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) and elemental compositions were analysed using EDAX spectrum. The band gap energy was estimated using optical absorption spectroscopy and the value was found to be 3.99 eV. The UV (310 nm) and visible (401, 420 and 560 nm) emissions were observed from PL spectrum. Brunauer‐Emmet‐Teller (BET) surface analysis was used for determining the surface area and average pore size of ZrO2 NPs.The photocatalytic degradation of the prepared ZrO2 NPs for organic dyes had been studied under visible light irradiation. Results showed that 68 % degradation was achieved within 135 min for Methylene Blue (MB) dye but other dyes almost remains unchanged during the same reaction times. Abstract : The work is all about the structural and photocatalytic activity analysis of t‐ZrO2 nanoparticles (NPs). A schematic diagram of dye degradation presented in this work. All the figures that were mentioned in the work will give enough information regarding micro‐structural t‐ZrO2 .