A facile and green sonochemical route for the synthesis of ZnFe2O4 nanoparticles

Recently spinel transition metal oxides (AB2O4) containing two metal elements have gained great attention as promising electrode materials. Particularly, among the spinel metal ferrites (MFe2O4), ZnFe2O4 is the most promising due to its low toxicity, high specific surface area, good chemical performance and ultralow-cost, environmental benignity and rich abundance [1-2]. In this research, ZnFe2O4 nanoparticles have been prepared by sonochemical method via weak ultrasonic irradiation at DI water. Fe(NO3)3.9H2O and Zn(NO3)2.6H2O were used as reagents and the resulted precursor was calcined in the air at 400C for 3hours. The precursor and resultant product were characterized using thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), fourier transform infrared (FT-IR), X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) as well as Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM).