Synthesis of cerium oxide (CeO₂) with high surface area through microwave assisted hydrothermal method

The objective of this research is synthesize nanoparticles with high surface area of Ceria (CeO₂) catalyst by a microwave hydrothermal method. For that it was used a 5% concentration in weight of [Ce(NO₃)_3.6H₂O] and 10 mL of [NaOH (5M)] under processing conditions in the equipment: maximum temperature of 150 deg C for 60 min with heating rate of ¹⁵C /min. The resulting sample was characterized by XRD, SEM and BET method. It was observed that the Ceria particles are presented spatially in cubic structure, with crystallite size of 10 nm and surface area of 112 m²/g. Through the pore size distribution it was possible to observe that these were in mesoporous size, ranging from 3 to 30 nm. The possibility of obtaining catalysts with nanometer scale and high surface area by beans of microwave hydrothermal method, which involves low energy (low temperatures) and short synthesis time, makes this method very interesting and promising. (author)