Effect of aging time and calcination temperature on the cerium oxide nanoparticles synthesis via reverse co-precipitation method

In the present work, the cerium nitrate hexa-hydrate and ammonium hydroxide, used as the starting materials and the weakly agglomerated cerium oxide nanoparticles was synthesized by simple and cost effective reverse co-precipitation method. The effect of aging time and calcination temperature on structural properties of synthesized nanopowder was investigated by X-ray diffractometry (XRD), simultaneous thermal analysis (STA), Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and transmission electron spectroscopy (TEM) analytical methods. The investigation showed that aging of the precipitated precursors has pronounced effect on the decreasing of the agglomeration, increase in the crystallinity and the crystallite size of the final product obtained after calcination. Also, increase in the calcination temperature led to the appreciable increase in the crystallite size as well as the crystallinity.   Key words: Aging time, ammonium hydroxide, calcination temperature, ceria nanoparticles, reverse co-precipitation.