Defect-related photoluminescence and photocatalytic properties of porous ZnO nanosheets

• Published in: Journal of materials chemistry. A, Materials for energy and sustainability Vol. 2; no. 37; pp. 15377 - 15388
• Main Authors: Liu, Di, Lv, Yanhui, Zhang, Mo, Liu, Yanfang, Zhu, Yanyan, Zong, Ruilong, Zhu, Yongfa
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 01.01.2014
• Subjects: Annealing; Crystal defects; Nanostructure; Photocatalysis; Photoluminescence; Surface defects; Sustainability; Zinc oxide
• ISSN: 2050-7488; 2050-7496
• DOI: 10.1039/C4TA02678K

A porous ZnO nanosheet with a near-rectangular morphology has been successfully prepared through a simple solvothermal-annealing method using Zn sub(5)(OH) sub(6)(CO sub(3)) sub(2) as a pore-directing agent. Moreover, the features of ZnO can be easily tuned by changing the annealing temperature. The evolution of defects along with the increase of annealing temperature has been revealed as follows: the content of surface oxygen vacancy of the as-prepared samples first increases and then decreases, however, the content of impurities decreases gradually. A clear relationship between the defects and photoluminescence/photocatalytic characteristics of ZnO is observed. The defect-related emission mechanism of the visible photoluminescence (PL) for the as-prepared ZnO samples has been proposed. In addition, the samples also show good activities for photo-degradation of phenol under UV light irradiation. ZnO-500 degree C (annealed at 500 degree C) exhibits the best photocatalytic activity, which is superior to that of commercial ZnO. The photocatalytic activity can be greatly influenced by the relative concentration ratio of surface defects to bulk defects, crystallization performance and specific surface area.