Synthesis and characterization of Ca2+ substituted barium niobate nanopaticles for photocatalytic and luminescence applications

•Nanoparticles of Ca2+ (30 mol%) substituted BaNb2O6 were synthesized.•Ca2+ ions occupy newer 8d Wyckoff positions rather than 4c.•Self-activated photoluminescence was observed.•Excellent H2 generation tendency from pure water under UV light was also observed.

Ca2+ substituted barium niobate i.e. CaxBa1-xNb2O6 (x = 0.3) compound in nanoparticles form was synthesized by a simple co-precipitation method for the first time and its structural characterization has been done by using powder X-ray diffraction data. Other characterizations were done by using transmission electron microscopy, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and ultraviolet-visible spectroscopy. It was found that the CaxBa1-xNb2O6 (x = 0.3) compound stabilizes in the orthorhombic phase (Pbcn space group) with the lattice parameters a = 14.984 Å, b = 5.761 Å and c = 5.216 Å. A representative TEM image shows the irregular sphere like morphology of the synthesized particles with the size ranging from 70 to 120 nm. The optical band gap energy was found to be 3.74 eV. It was observed that the synthesized nanoparticles exhibit excellent H2 evolution tendency and self–activated photoluminescence under the excitation of UV light. These activities were assigned to the nanocrystalline nature of the synthesized material.

Graphical abstractFigure optionsDownload full-size imageDownload as PowerPoint slide