Photocatalytic and antimicrobial effects of zinc oxide nanoparticles prepared by thermal decomposition of zinc benzenepolycarboxylato complexes

Zinc oxide nanoparticles (ZnO-NPs) have been a subject of numerous researches owing to their multifunctional properties in many applications, such as solar cells, UV light-emitting devices, gas sensors and photocatalysts. ZnO-NPs can be synthesized through various methods and their features can be tailored by shape and size, resulting in new applications relevant to their structural properties. The synthesis of ZnO-NPs via controlled thermal decomposition of the single-source precursors represents a novel synthetic methodology. The basic goal of this study was to investigate the influence of precursors on crystallite size and morphology of the resulting ZnO-NPs. Four structurally characterized Zn complexes with different benzenepolycarboxylato ligands [1] were used as precursors for investigation of photocatalytic and antimicrobial effects of thermally obtained ZnO-NPs. The XRPD and FESEM analysis of ZnO-NPs, prepared by thermolysis of Zn precursors at 450 °C in the air atmosphere, revealed hexagonal wurtzite structure (space group P63mc, a ≈ 3.25 and c ≈ 5.21 Å) with an average crystallite size in the range of 39–47 nm and similar morphology. The best photocatalytic activity for degradation of Reactive orange 16 dye has been observed for ZnO-NPs where crystallites form the smallest agglomerates. All obtained ZnO-NPs showed excellent inhibitory effect against Gram-positive bacteria Staphylococcus aureus and Gram-negative bacteria Escherichia coli.