A soft solution method for synthesizing nanocrystalline CeO2 powders via formation of cerium citrate compounds with subsequent thermal decomposition was studied. Increasing calcinations temperature could result in a larger crystalline size, while increasing the citric acid content resulted in the powders with less agglomeration. Using this method, the CeO2 particles with a crystalline size of about 4 nm could be obtained. Initial study demonstrated that the precursor prepared with polyacrlic acid resulted in the powders with a crystalline size of about 20–30 nm.
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