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Synthesis and characterization of cadmium doped on ZnO thin films prepared by SILAR method for photocatalytic degradation properties of MB under UV irradiation

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Abstract

The presented manuscript deals with the synthesis of uniformly coated nanocrystalline ZnO and Cd-doped ZnO thin films with various concentrations (1, 3, and 5 wt%) via the successive ionic layer adsorption and reaction (SILAR) method. The physical and chemical attributes of the prepared films were examined through certain analytical techniques such as XRD, SEM with EDS, UV, PL, and RAMAN spectroscopy. The XRD, SEM, and Raman results confirmed that Cd is successfully incorporated on the surface of ZnO. The optical properties of the films were analyzed from absorption studies of Cd:ZnO thin films. Furthermore, the estimated optical band gap values of the Cd:ZnO films decrease from 3.03 to 2.95 eV. The photocatalytic properties of the synthesized ZnO and Cd:ZnO thin films were investigated against the methylene blue (MB) under UV light irradiation. The results of methylene blue photodegradation reached (49.6%) for ZnO films and (55.2%, 71.4%, and 82.5%) for Cd:ZnO films. Finally, this research suggests that the Cd:ZnO films exhibit better photocatalytic efficiency compared to the ZnO films.

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Data Availability Statement

This manuscript has associated data in a data repository. [Authors’ comment: The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.]

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, Thanthai Hans Roever College (Autonomous), Perambalur, Affiliated to Bharathidasan University, Trichy, 621 220, India

    M. Sathya & G. Selvan

  2. Thin Film and Nanoscience Research Lab, Department of Physics, Alagappa Government Arts College, Karaikudi, 621 220, India

    M. Karunakaran, S. Usha, M. Logitha & S. Prabakaran

  3. Division of Advanced Materials Engineering, Kongju National University, Budaedong 275, Seobuk-gu, Cheonan-si, Chungnam, 31080, Republic of Korea

    K. Kasirajan

  4. Department of Physics, Government Arts and Science College, Veppanthattai, Perambalur, 621 116, India

    P. Baskaran

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  1. M. Sathya
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Contributions

MS is first author and was involved in conceptualization, methodology, investigation; writing—original draft, formal analysis. GS helped in methodology, validation, visualization. KK contributed to validation, resources, writing—reviewing and editing. SU was involved in formal analysis, methodology. PB helped in methodology, validation, visualization. MK is the corresponding author and helped in validation, visualization, supervision.

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Correspondence to M. Karunakaran.

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Sathya, M., Selvan, G., Karunakaran, M. et al. Synthesis and characterization of cadmium doped on ZnO thin films prepared by SILAR method for photocatalytic degradation properties of MB under UV irradiation. Eur. Phys. J. Plus 138, 67 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/s13360-023-03667-1

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