Simple combustion synthesis and characterisation studies of spinel ferrite nanocatalysts

Abstract

In this present study, we have reported, metal doped magnesium ferrite newline(MxMg1-xFe2O4; M = Co and Ni; x = x = 0.0, 0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8 and 1.0) spinel newlinenanoparticles were synthesized by the modified sol-gel combustion method. The newlineeffects of cobalt/nickel dopant on morphology, structural, optical, magnetic and newlinephoto-catalytic properties of spinel MxMg1-xFe2O4 nanoparticles were investigated. newlinePowder XRD data showed the formation of single-phase spinel with cubic structure newlinefor all compositions. The formation of spherical shaped nanoparticle-like newlinemorphologies of spinel ferrites was confirmed by HR-SEM and HR-TEM techniques. newlineThe present study investigated the UV-Vis DRS measurements to verify how the newlinemorphology of spinel ferrites affects their absorption properties. It was found that the newlinemagnetic property changes with the addition of dopant cations, and it may be due to newlinethe distribution of cations in tetrahedral (A-) and octahedral (B-) sites. However, the newlinemagnetization values are increased with increasing the concentration of Ni2+/Co2+ newlinedopant in spinel (MgFe2O4) ferrites. It is mainly due to the non-magnetic nature of newlineMg2+ (0 and#956;B)) cations is substituted by the higher magnetic nature of Ni2+/Co2+ dopant newlinecations. The effect of Ni2+/Co2+ doping on MgFe2O4 nanoparticles for the newlinephotocatalytic degradation (PCD) of MB was evaluated. The PCD efficiency of MB is newlinevery low when used undoped MgFe2O4 nanocatalyst, and it was enhanced with newlineincreasing the Ni2+/Co2+ dopant and showed a maximum PCD activity for the sample newlineCo0.6Mg0.4Fe2O4 and Ni0.6Mg0.4Fe2O4 (x = 0.6) nanoparticles, which may be due to newlinethe higher surface area volume ratio and smaller particle size. Nevertheless, excessive newlinedopants of Ni2+/Co2+ -dopant (x = 0.8 and 1.0) in spinel MgFe2O4 lattice can retard the newlinephotocatalytic activity, due to the higher particle size and lower surface area of the newlinesamples, which results in the decrease of PCD efficiency. newline