Optical studies of capped CdSe nanoparticles and their photocatalytic activity for degradation of methylene blue dye

Polyethylene glycol (PEG) and mercaptoethanol (ME)-capped CdSe nanoparticles (NPs) have been successfully prepared and systematic investigation on structural, optical and photocatalytic properties is presented. The intrinsic characteristics of resulting nanoparticles were studied by X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), UV-visible and photoluminescence (PL) spectrophotometer. Cubic phase, nearly uniform size (similar to 10 nm) and spherical morphology of the synthesized nanoparticles were established through XRD and TEM analysis. Spectroscopic measurements exhibit that capping agent can effectively tune energy band structure. ME-capped CdSe NPs exhibit higher light emission efficiency as compared to PEG capping. Photocatalytic activity of CdSe nanoparticles on methylene blue (MB) dye, a significant enhancement was observed in the photodegradation efficiency. A maximum degradation of MB dye (73.5%) was obtained.