Electronic structure and photocatalytic activity of samarium doped cerium oxide nanoparticles for hazardous rose bengal dye degradation

Abstract Sm doped CeO2 (Sm = 0%, 2%, 4%, 6% and 8%) nanoparticles have been synthesized by sol-gel method for spintronics and photodegradation applications. Structural properties were studied using X-ray diffraction that showed single-phase crystalline nature with some structural distortions. Raman spectroscopy was employed to study the defects where longitudinal optical mode confirmed the presence of defects in the form of oxygen vacancies. Magnetic studies infer that saturation magnetization (MS) increased with Sm doping from 0.36 × 10−3 emu/g for pure CeO2 to 15.8 × 10−3 emu/g for Sm 6% and then, decreased for Sm 8%. Reported results also demonstrated the excellent photodegradation of UV-irradiated rose bengal dye. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) was used to illustrate the electronic structure, including the contribution of each ionic state, i.e. Ce3+ and Ce4+. Oxygen vacancies and formation of new networks led to the origin of room temperature ferromagnetic behaviour and excellent photocatalytic degradation of harmful rose bengal dye.