Correlation between surface morphology and photocatalytic performance of electrochemically anodized SnO 2 nanoparticles

Dependence of photocatalytic activity of tin oxide nanostructures (SnO 2 NS) on the surface morphology is reported. In contrast to previous literature, an electrochemical anodization of Sn foils was successfully carried out to switch SnO 2 porous into nanoparticles (NPs). Modifying the surface was limited to a short-time anodization between 10 and 20 min with fixing electrolyte concentration and anodization voltage. Semi-circular tetragonal-phased SnO 2 NPs were figured out by field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). Also, fluorescence spectra confirm that the energy gap was expanded to 4.14 eV. Accordingly, high photo-efficiency (93.08 %) for degrading methylene blue (MB) dye was obtained. Therefore, unlike several studies on porous, the results suggest that the anodized nanoparticles are promising for high-performance catalysts.