A promising nanocatalyst: Upgraded Kraft lignin by titania and palladium nanoparticles for organic dyes reduction

Abstract

The evaluation of dye degradation was adorned a great interest due to scarcity of water, courtesy of industrialization. Here, Kraft lignin was upgraded by immobilization of TiO2 nanoparticles (NPs) by the reflux method (KL-T). Palladium (Pd) NPs were produced in a promising way by laser ablation in liquid (LAL) and loaded on KL-T to prepare an efficient nanocatalyst (KL-T/Pd). The synthesized KL-T/Pd is characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transforms infrared (FT-IR), Scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Energy-dispersive X-ray spectrometry (EDX), and Transmission electron microscope (TEM) analyses. The KL-T/Pd nanocomposite was applied as an efficient and novel nanocatalyst for the reduction of methylene blue (MB) and methyl orange (MO) by NaBH4 as a reducing agent in aqueous media at ambient temperature. Our experimental results displayed that the 1 mg of KL-T/Pd catalyst can be reduced MB and MO organic dyes within 23 and 8 s, respectively at room temperature. The KL-T/Pd nanocatalyst can be recycled and reused four times with no considerable loss of performance. Having different advantages such as high catalytic performance, safe synthesis method, and high stability, lignin was suggested as a natural substrate.