Evaluation of the Structural, Photonic and Morphologic Effects Caused by Zinc Doping in the Titanium Dioxide Powder Samples Obtained by Sol-Gel Method

The anatase phase of titanium dioxide ceramic material plays important rule in heterogeneous photocatalysis, beside the global phase amount and powder morphology. Some of structural parameters are useful to predict several properties, including the crystallization process and mechanism of the irreversible anatase-to-rutile phase transition. The photocatalytic process is based on charge transference from electron-hole pair to material surface, starting some redox reactions in aqueous media. The stable positive defects harm the recombination event and improve the final properties of that material. Modifiers with lower oxidation state than titanium (IV) is applicable for this purpose, what idea becomes the objective of this work. The Sol-Gel method was used to prepare bare and zinc doped-titanium dioxide powder samples reaching good compositional homogeneity for both samples calcined at 500 oC for 4 hours. Rietveld refinement carried out from raw x-ray diffraction patterns was used to demonstrate the formation of solid solution between zinc and titanium oxides. Besides that result, the determination of bandgap energy and SEM images corroborated the structural changes caused by zinc insertion in anatase phase and important difference in powder morphology was observed for zinc doped powder samples in order to reduce the agglomeration degree for better performance for heterogeneous photocatalysis applications.

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