Synthesis and characterisation of nanostructured BiFeO3 for photodecolourisation of azo dyes using visible light

In this work, effort is being made to synthesize a narrow band gap ferroelectric perovskite nanostructure semiconductor that is BiFeO3 (BFO). The BFO nanopowders were synthesized at 650ºC using a self-combustion method with glycine as the fuel. The effect of the different fuel concentrations, annealing temperatures and the duration of annealing are all demonstrated to influence the phase and crystallography of the synthesized nanoparticles. The author has demonstrated that the self-combustion process can be used to produce high purity BFO nanopowders which exhibit good absorption in the visible-light regime as determined by the UV-Vis-NIR spectroscopy with a measured optical band gap of 2.22 eV. Cont/d.