SYNTHESIS, CHARACTERIZATION, AND CATALYTIC ACTIVITY OF ZNZRO₃ MIXED METAL OXIDE FOR METHYLENE BLUE OXIDATION

Zinc zirconate (ZnZrO₃) is a mixed-metal oxide with potential applications in heterogeneous catalysis and advanced oxidation processes. In the present study, ZnZrO₃ was synthesized by the sol-gel method under the optimized experimental conditions previously established and reported by the authors.[1] The synthesized material was subjected to thermal treatment at different temperatures and characterized using differential thermal analysis (DTA), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) to investigate its thermal behavior, phase evolution, and structural characteristics. The catalytic activity of ZnZrO₃ was evaluated for the oxidative degradation of methylene blue (MB) in the presence of hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂) under heterogeneous catalytic conditions. For comparison, NiZrO₃, which had previously been synthesized and characterized by the sol-gel method according to the authors’ earlier work[2], was evaluated under the same catalytic conditions. The results showed that the ZnZrO₃ phase was formed at high calcination temperatures, with the ZnZrO₃ phase obtained at 1000 °C. The catalytic experiments demonstrated that ZnZrO₃ exhibited higher catalytic efficiency toward MB oxidation than NiZrO₃, with catalytic efficiencies of 58.33% and 28.57%, respectively. These findings indicate that ZnZrO₃ possesses promising catalytic activity for the heterogeneous oxidative treatment of methylene blue using hydrogen peroxide and demonstrate its potential as a mixed-metal oxide catalyst for advanced oxidation applications.