Fabrication of nanospinel ZnCr2O4 using sol-gel method and its application on removal of azo dye from aqueous solution

For the first time, nanoparticles of zinc chromite, spinel ZnCr2O4 have been fabricated by the thermal decomposition of Zn-Cr gel prepared by sol-gel method in the presence of oxalic acid as a chelating agent. It was shown that the well-crystallized spinel structure is formed after calcination at 450 °C. The nanospinel has been characterized by differential thermal analysis (DTA), X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), infrared spectroscopy (IR), and transmission electron microscope (TEM). The average particle size is approximately 13 nm according to the TEM image. The nanoparticles of zinc chromites showed excellent adsorption properties towards reactive dye, reactive blue 5 (RB5). The adsorption studies have been carried out for contact time, different pH values, different temperatures, and adsorbent doses. The investigation of removal kinetics of RB5 indicates that the removal process obeys the rate of second-order kinetic equation. The results indicate that the Langmuir adsorption isotherm fitted the data better than the Freundlich. Also, the photocatalytic degradation of RB5 using spinel ZnCr2O4 under UV irradiation at pH = 1 has been also examined. The results showed that the degradation of RB5 dye follows merely an adsorption process.