Sprayed Nanocomposite Thin Films for Water Purification

Spray deposited ZnO-TiO2 nanocomosite thin films were successfully prepared by using Zinc acetate and Titanium Acetate Acetonate (TiAA) as precursor onto glass and Fluorine doped tin oxide (FTO) coated glass substrate at 450 deg. In this study the polycrystalline ZnO- TiO2 nanocomposite thin films were prepared with the different molar ratio of ZnO:TiO2. The prepared thin films were characterized by XRD, SEM and optical properties. All film are polycrystalline in nature. The optimized molar ratio was 80:20. The direct optical band gap of optimized thin films was 3.10 eV. The photoelectrocatalytic activity of prepared thin films was evaluated by measuring the photoelectrocatalytic degradation of Metylene Blue (BM). Inactivation studies of suspensions of E.Coli. in a parallel plate reactor showed that bacterial count reduced by a factor 10E7 with ZnO-TiO2 electrode with applied external bias of 1.5 V.. All water born bacteria were inactivated within 30 min reaction time. Thus ZnO-TiO2 nanocomposite thin films can be used series with common filter which inactivate water born bacteria as well as degrade the any organic contamination in the water.