Bifunctional ZnO sphere/r-GO composites for supercapacitor and photocatalytic activity of organic dye degradation

Abstract Here in, ZnO sphere/r-GO composites was synthesized by a simple hydrothermal method. The morphological characterizations (FE-SEM and TEM) indicated the ZnO sphere covered by r-GO nanosheets. The formation of the prepared ZnO sphere/r-GO composites was investigated by XRD and FT-IR analytical techniques, respectively. The composite electrode material exhibited high specific capacitance of 293.5 F/g at the current density 1 A g−1 and also outstanding cyclic stability of 96% retained after 10,000 charge discharge (GCD) cycles at of 6 A g−1. The catalytic activity of ZnO sphere and ZnO sphere/r-GO composites shows the degradation percentage if 76.2 and 94.6%, respectively. ZnO sphere/r-GO composite shows around 24% of catalytic enhancement due to the high specific surface area of r-GO, and also the composite shows high reliability and degradation efficiency is still retained at 96.9% upto 5 cycles. The composite material is a potential candidate for high performance energy storage and photocatalytic applications.