Sol-gel zinc oxide nanoparticles: advances in synthesis and applications

Zinc oxide nanoparticles (ZnO) exhibit numerous characteristics such as biocompatibility, UV protection, antibacterial activity, high thermal conductivity, binding energy, and high refractive index that make them ideal candidates to be applied in a variety of products like solar cells, rubber, cosmetics, as well as medical and pharmaceutical products. Different strategies for ZnO nanoparticles’ preparation have been applied: sol-gel method, co-precipitation method, etc. The sol-gel method is an economic and efficient chemical technique for nanoparticle (NPs) generation that has the ability to adjust the structural and optical features of the NPs. Nanostructures are generated from an aqueous solution including metallic precursors, chemicals for modifying pH using either a gel or a sol as a yield. Among the various approaches, the sol-gel technique was revealed to be one of the desirable techniques for the synthesis of ZnO nanoparticles. In this review, we explain some novel investigations about the synthesis of zinc oxide nanoparticles via sol-gel technique and applications of sol-gel zinc oxide nanoparticles. Furthermore, we study recent sol-gel ZnO nanoparticles, their significant characteristics, and their applications in biomedical applications, antimicrobial packaging, drug delivery, semiconductors, biosensors, catalysts, photoelectron devices, and textiles.