Photocatalytic and antibacterial activity of Yttrium doped TiO2 nanostructure

Abstract

In this study, TiO2 nanostructures were doped with Yttrium (Y) at various doping concentrations using a low-cost approach called chemical co-precipitation, and then used for photocatalysis and antibacterial activity application. The effects of yttrium doping on TiO2 nanostructure properties such as crystal structure, chemical impurities, and optical features were investigated using EDAX, XRD, TEM, SAED, RAMAN, UV–Vis, and PL techniques. X-ray diffraction (XRD) confirmed the presence of the Rutile tetragonal crystalline phase in both pure and Y doped-TiO2 nanostructure. TEM images of synthesised nanomaterials depict typical nanoellipsoid morphology. UV–Vis absorption spectroscopy revealed that due to doping, the optical band gap was reduced from 3.28 eV to 3.11 eV. Low temperature Raman spectroscopy was used to determine variations in the isobaric Gruneisen parameter for both pure and Y doped materials. The photocatalytic activities of samples were evaluated by the photodegradation of methyl blue (MB) aqueous solution under 250 W UV lamp irradiation. The photodegradation efficiency of TiO2 has been found to vary with Y doping, despite 6% Y doped TiO2 nanostructure are most efficient than other samples. Furthermore, antibacterial analysis indicated that the doping exhibits excellent antibacterial properties when evaluated against E. coli culture.

Keywords

• Y doped TiO2 nanostructure
• X-ray diffraction
• Low-temperature Raman spectroscopy
• Photocatalysis
• Antibacterial activity