Abstract
Novel 3D flower-like Ag/AgCl/BiOCOOH ternary heterojunction photocatalysts were fabricated by the solvothermal and in-situ precipitation methods, followed by light reduction treatment. The Ag/AgCl nanoparticles were homogeneously distributed on 3D BiOCOOH microspheres. These obtained catalysts were characterized by XRD, SEM, TEM, diffuse reflectance spectra (DRS), and photoluminescence (PL). As expected, they exhibited extraordinary photocatalytic capabilities for the elimination of rhodamine B (RhB) and ciprofloxacin (CIP) under simulated sunlight, the results revealed that the Ag/AgCl/BiOCH-3 with 20 wt.% of Ag/AgCl possessed the maximum activity, and the rate constant for the RhB degradation reached up to 0.1353 min−1, which was about 16.5 or 12.2 times that of bare BiOCOOH or Ag/AgCl. The PL characterization further verified that Ag/AgCl/BiOCOOH heterojunctions were endowed with the effective separation of photogenerated carriers. The excellent photocatalytic ability of Ag/AgCl/BiOCOOH could be credited to the synergistic interactions between Ag/AgCl and BiOCOOH, which not only substantially widened the light absorption, but also evidently hindered the charge recombination. The trapping experiments revealed that the dominant reactive species in RhB removal were h+, •OH, and •O2− species. In addition, Ag/AgCl/BiOCOOH was quite stable and easily recyclable after multiple cycles. The above results imply that the 3D flower-like Ag/AgCl/BiOCOOH ternary heterojunction photocatalyst holds promising prospects in treating industrial wastewater.
Highlights
The massive development of global industry has brought about the aggravation of environmental pollution
The band structures of Ag/AgCl and BiOCOOH are suitable for the generation of a novel plasmonic “type II” heterojunction, which could efficiently promote the separation of photo-excited charge carriers during the photocatalytic process
This study offers deep insight into the design of highly efficient ternary heterojunction photocatalysts for wastewater treatment
Summary
The massive development of global industry has brought about the aggravation of environmental pollution. Contamination of refractory pollutants (e.g., industrial dyes and pharmaceutical antibiotics) in the aquatic environment poses an overwhelming threat to human health To mitigate this problem, scientists have been devoted to exploring effective and eco-friendly techniques [1,2]. The fabrication of semiconductor heterojunctions is an effective route to conquer these drawbacks [11,12,13,14,15,17,18] In this regard, searching for an appropriate candidate to be integrated with BiOCOOH for the efficient removal of pollutants has been very anticipated but challenging. The band structures of Ag/AgCl and BiOCOOH are suitable for the generation of a novel plasmonic “type II” heterojunction, which could efficiently promote the separation of photo-excited charge carriers during the photocatalytic process. This study offers deep insight into the design of highly efficient ternary heterojunction photocatalysts for wastewater treatment
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