Structural, optical, electrical and catalytic properties of precursor solution-aged spray deposited undoped, Zn-doped and Ag-doped CdO thin films

Photocatalytic performance of precursor solution-aged undoped, Zn-doped CdO (CdO:Zn) and Ag-doped CdO (CdO:Ag) thin films has been reported in this paper. Perfume atomizer is adopted to deposit the films. CdO, CdO:Zn and CdO:Ag thin films exhibit cubic crystal structure. The crystallite size values were 34, 31 and 27 nm, respectively, for the CdO, CdO:Zn and CdO:Ag thin films. In the EDX spectra of the CdO:Zn and CdO:Ag thin films, Zn and Ag were observed along with Cd and O. The CdO:Zn and CdO:Ag thin films exhibit increased transparency and widened band gap values. PL spectra showed peaks related to oxygen vacancies for all the films. Reduced resistivity was evinced for the CdO:Zn and CdO:Ag thin films. The degradation efficiencies of the CdO, CdO:Zn and CdO:Ag thin films against methyl orange after 75 min light exposure were 76.4, 84.3 and 90.4%, respectively. The CdO:Zn and CdO:Ag catalysts exhibit satisfactory stability with better reusable nature and are suitable for the effective treatment of organic toxic dyes.