Simple Growth and Characterization of α-Sb₂O₄: Evaluation of their Photo-catalytic and Chemical Sensing Applications

Abstract

A comprehensive study on the synthesis, characterization and application of antimony oxide (α-Sb2O4) has been reported in this paper. Antimony oxide (α-Sb2O4) is successfully synthesized by hydrothermal method using antimony chloride and urea as a reducing materials. The morphology of the nanomaterial is investigated by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM). Sheet like morphology of α-Sb2O4 ranging from 0.2 µm to 3.0 µm are found in the FE-SEM images. The detailed structural characterizations are performed by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared spectrophotometer (FT-IR), and Raman spectrophotometer respectively. It has been confirmed that the synthesized materials are well-crystalline and pure antimony oxide (α-Sb2O4). Optical properties are studied using UV-VIS spectrophotometer, where the direct band-gap of α-Sb2O4 is calculated to be 3.26 eV. The photo-catalytic degradation and chemical sensing applications are successfully checked by simple and reliable UV/vis. spectroscopy and I-V methods respectively.