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-ray diffraction 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.