sol-gel synthesis of zno nanoparticles and zno-tio2-sio2 nanocomposites and their photo-catalyst investigation in methylene blue degradation

in this work firstly zno nanoparticles were synthesized via a simple precipitation method. at the second step titanium dioxide and silicon dioxide shell were synthesized on the core. for preparation zno-tio2-sio2 the sol product was calcinated at 500 ºc for 2h. properties of the product were examined by x-raydiffraction pattern (xrd), scanning electron microscope (sem) and fourier transform infrared (ft-ir) spectroscopy. the photo-catalytic behavior of zno-sio2-tio2 nanocomposite was evaluated using the degradation of a methylene blue aqueous solution under visible light irradiation. the results show that zno-sio2-tio2 nanocomposites have applicable photo-catalytic performance.