Research Article
Open Access
Photocatalytic degradation of methylene blue dye using ZnO thin films
S.Shankar, M.Saroja, M.Venkatachalam, G.Parthasarathy
Thin film centre, Department of Electronics, Erode Arts and Science College, Erode, Tamil
Nadu, India.
S.Shankar et al /Int.J. Chemical Concepts. 2017,3(1),pp 180-188.
Abstract
Zinc oxide thin films were deposited on glass substrates using sol gel spin coating method.
Zinc acetate dihydrate was used as a starting material. Isoproponol and monoethanolamine were used as
the solvent and stabilizer respectively. The prepared solution was dropped on the cleaned glass substrates
and the substrates were rotated at 2000 rpm for 20s and the ZnO thin films were prepared by repeated
coating. The prepared thin films were annealed at 250,350 and 450oC. The annealed films were
characterized by x-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), ultraviolet – visible
spectrophotometer (UV-Vis), photoluminescence spectroscopy (PL). Photocatalytic activities of ZnO
thin films annealed at 450oC have been examined towards the photo degradation of methylene blue by
varying degradation time and area of catalysist. A maximum efficiency of 90.4% is reported using low
watt (8W) UV source.
Keywords
ZnO thin films, spin coating method, photocatalytic activity.