Alkaline earth metal doped tin oxide as a novel oxygen storage material

Abstract Alkaline earth metal doped tin oxide (SnO 2 ) hollow nanospheres with a diameter of 50 nm have been synthesized successfully via a facial solvothermal route in a very simple system composed of only ethanol, acetic acid, SnCl 4 ·5H 2 O and A(NO 3 ) 2 · x H 2 O (A = Mg, Ca, Sr, Ba). The synthesized undoped SnO 2 and A-doped SnO 2 hollow nanospheres were characterized by the oxygen storage capacity (OSC), X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy and the Brunauer–Emmet–Teller (BET) technique. The OSC values of all samples were measured using thermogravimetric-differential thermal analysis. The incorporation of alkaline earth metal ion into tin oxide greatly enhanced the thermal stability and OSC. Especially, Ba-doped SnO 2 hollow nanospheres calcined at 1000 °C for 20 h with a BET surface area of 61 m 2  g −1 exhibited the considerably high OSC of 457 μmol-O g −1 and good thermal stability. Alkaline earth metal doped tin oxide has the potential to be a novel oxygen storage material.