Short-time Fabrication of Electrochemical Anodized SnO and SnO2 Nanoparticles: Catalytic Property Enhancement

Abstract

Abstract In this article, we reported, for the first time, the fabrication of a mixture of tin oxide nanoparticles and porous using low-cost, safe, and short-time electrochemical anodization technique. The nanostructures (NS) were fabricated using pure Sn foil with no need for doping or forming a heterostructure with other materials. For high-efficient catalysts, the dependence of photoactivity on the NS morphology was motivated. Hence, the modification in the surface morphology with the anodization time change was investigated. Consequently, the electrochemical process on the foil was implemented at a constant potential of 8 V for 10, 15, and 20 min. X-ray diffraction (XRD) revealed the tetragonal crystalline structure of SnO and \({\text{S}\text{n}\text{O}}_{2}\). Also, nanoparticles and porous morphologies were observed by field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM). Furthermore, energy gaps of \({\text{S}\text{n}\text{O}}_{2}\) estimated by fluorescence measurements were found to expand to about 4.14 eV. All the fabricated NS exhibited high degradation efficiency for methylene blue (MB) dye, which was up to 87% after 120 min of solar irradiation. A comparison of the results with other reported findings suggests that the anodized NS are very promoted photocatalysts.