Facile tartaric acid assisted microwave synthesis of spherical clusters of S, N, and C doped ZnO for solar photocatalytic applications

In this work, C, N, and S doped spherical clusters of ZnO nanoparticles were synthesized through the microwaveassisted polymeric gelation method. The prepared samples were characterized using XRD, FT-IR, SEM, TEM, and UV-Visible spectrophotometer. The efficacy of doped ZnO in degrading an organic pollutant, methylene blue, was photo catalytically investigated under sunlight illuminations. The UV-Vis. spectrophotometric studies show that S and N doped ZnO deliver excellent photocatalytic properties when compared to bare C doped ZnO. The samples followed the trend in photocatalytic activity as C- ZnO < N-ZnO < S- ZnO, with the effective time of dye degradation as 180 min, 140 min and 120 min. respectively, following their decreasing crystallite size and bandgap energy.

Automated summary

In this study, C, N, and S doped spherical clusters of ZnO nanoparticles were synthesized and characterized using various techniques. The results showed that S and N doped ZnO samples exhibited excellent photocatalytic properties in degrading dyes.