Urea assisted ceria nanocubes for efficient removal of malachite green organic dye from aqueous system

This study describes a simple, high-yield, rapid, and inexpensive route for the synthesis of cubic shape-like cerium oxide nanocubes (CeO₂ NCs) using different urea concentrations (0.5, 1.0, and 2.0 g) by the hydrothermal method. The synthesized nanocubes (NCs) are labeled as CeO₂ NCs-0.5, CeO₂ NCs-1.0, and CeO₂ NCs-2.0, corresponding to 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0 g of urea, respectively. The synthesized NCs were characterized by FT-IR, UV-visible, XRD, XPS, SEM and HR-TEM analysis. The synthesized NCs were cubic in shape with average sizes of 12, 12, and 13 nm for the CeO₂ NCs-0.5, CeO₂ NCs-1.0, and CeO₂ NCs-2.0, respectively, obtained by the XRD analysis. The catalytic activity of the CeO₂ NCs was studied for the purpose of obtaining the reduction of malachite green (MG) in the presence of sodium borohydride (NaBH₄) at room temperature.