Antibacterial and Blue shift investigations in sol–gel synthesized CrxZn1−xO Nanostructures

In this paper, a systematic study of structural, morphological, phononic, vibrational and optical properties of Zn1−xCrxO nanostructures has been reported. These particles are synthesized through simple sol–gel chemical technique at low temperature using simply available laboratory chemicals i,e zinc acetate and sodium hydroxide. The detailed structural studies carried out by X-ray diffraction method (XRD) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) reveals that the as-synthesized nanoparticles are well-crystalline and possessing hexagonal wurtzite structure in 54–57nm range. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) shows the synthesized nanostrucures were grown in high density with less agglomeration and their different morphologies observed after doping. The presences of functional groups were characterized by employing Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). Compared with the photoluminescence (PL) spectrum of the undoped ZnO, the peak position of ultraviolet (UV) emission of the Cr-doped ZnO nanostructures exhibits remarkable blue shift, also confirmed by Raman studies, and the deep level emission band was sharply suppressed. Band gap of synthesized samples has been evaluated using DRS (UV–Vis mode). It is found that the band gap increases as Cr doping took place which is attributed to the combined effect of size reduction and doping. The synthesized CrxZn1−xO nanostructures showed potential applications in destruction of bacteria. •Highly Cr–doped ZnO nanostructures were synthesized using aqueous solutions.•We examine the control over the growth of synthesized nanostructures.•Blue shift was observed due doping in ZnO nanostructures.•Enhancement of antibacterial activities in doped ZnO nanostructures.