A remarkable enhancement in photocatalytic activity of facilely synthesized Terbium@Zinc oxide nanoparticles by flash combustion route for optoelectronic applications

The facile synthesis of pristine and Terbium@Zinc oxide (Tb@ZnO) samples was produced by fast combustion route. The roughly spherical shaped morphology of Tb@ZnO was investigated by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) with agglomerated images of small size of particles. The dimension of particle shrinkages with increased the doping contents of Tb into ZnO lattice. The optical band gap of Tb@ZnO sample varies with the concentration of Tb and found to be decreased as 3.276, 3.267, 3.261 and 3.260 eV on increasing concentration of Tb from 1 to 5 wt%. The non-polar phonon mode with E2 symmetry was observed at 99 and 437 cm−1 while polar mode with A1 and E1 symmetry was reported at 330 and 580 cm−1, respectively, for pristine and Tb@ZnO samples. The photocatalytic activity of Tb@ZnO NPs has been investigated by the decolorization of methylene green (MG) dye under black light irradiation (367 nm). A remarkable photocatalytic performance of Tb@ZnO was noticed compared to the pure one and the highest percentage of activity was obtained for 1.0 wt% Tb@ZnO. Current outputs proposed the use of synthesized Tb@ZnO NPs in optoelectronic and photocatalyst applications.