Mechanochemical Synthesis of Fe2O3 Nanoparticles

In this work, formation of iron oxide nanoparticles by mechanochemical reactions in different milling times was studied. During the mechanical milling, the solid-state displacement reaction of 3Na2CO3 + 2FeCl3.6H2O = 6NaCl + Fe2O3.6H2O + 3CO2 was induced to form iron oxide nanoparticles. A simple washing process was done to remove NaCl by-product and subsequently the particles dried at 105°C for 12 h. Nanoparticles size and the mechanochemical effect were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and particle size analysis. Experimental results show that increasing the milling time can effectively reduce the nanoparticle size of Fe2O3. The average Fe2O3 nanoparticles size is about 14 nm for 2h and 4 nm for 5h milling process.