Effects of Ag Dopant and Ultraviolet Irradiation On Structural Properties Of Zinc Oxide Nanostructures

摘要

ZnO nanorods are promising UV light driven photocatalyst for the degradation of organic dyes. In this work, the effects of Ag dopant (0.02 to 0.1 mol%) and ultraviolet irradiation (0 to 6 min) on structural, optical and photocatalytic properties of zinc oxide nanorods were investigate. The Ag incorporation ZnO nanoraod have been grown on glass substrate by chemical solution deposition method. The films were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and UV-vis absorption spectroscopy (UV-vis). The XRD spectra of the Ag incorporation ZnO (Ag-ZnO) films indicate that Ag was incorporated in the wurtzite hexagonal crystal structure of ZnO and the crystallinity were enhanced with increasing of Ag amount as well as ultraviolet irradiation time. SEM micrographs of pure ZnO films revealed the uniform distribution of rod-like nanostructure of size of about 30-40 nm. Increasing Ag amount as well as irradiation time stimulated the optical properties of ZnO nanostructures. The photocatalytic activity of these nanostructures was evaluated by analysing UV irradiation degradation of methyl orange (MO) dye and it was observed that Ag-ZnO show significantly enhanced photocatalytic activity for degradation of MO, as compared to ZnO nanorods.