Rare earth metal co-doped Zn0·9La0.05M0.05O (M = Yb, Sm, Nd) nanocrystals; energy gap tailoring, structural, photocatalytic and antibacterial studies

Abstract Novel Zn0·95La0·05O and co-doped Zn0·9La0.05M0.05O (M = Yb, Nd, Sm) nanocrystals were prepared by co-precipitation method. Different analytical techniques such as XRD, FTIR, SEM, and UV–vis were used to investigate the effect of doping of rare-earth (RE) ions in ZnO lattice. The microstructural study was performed using Scherrer, W–H, and SSP methods. UV–vis analysis has shown that the energy bandgap is redshifted (3.2–2.8 eV) by rare-earth (RE) ions doping in ZnO. The other optical parameters were also investigated to strengthen the optical study. The photocatalytic performance of grown catalysts was tested under direct sunlight against methylene blue (MB), rhodamine-B (RhB), and phenol (Ph). The antibacterial activity was carried out against S. aureus and P. Vulgaris bacteria. The La/Sm co-doped nanocrystal has the highest photocatalytic and antibacterial activity than others grown catalysts.