Bitter apple peel derived photoactive carbon dots for the sunlight induced photocatalytic degradation of crystal violet dye

Abstract

A simple and sustainable approach is described for the synthesis of photoactive carbon dots (CD) as an efficient photo-catalytic material. The photoactive-CD has been fabricated by simply charring the peels of Bitter Apple (BA). It is somewhat similar to the biochar synthesis. The photoactivity of BA peel derived photoactive-CD was tested under the illumination of sunlight for photodegradation of a pollutant organic dye, crystal violet (CV). A possible mechanism has been proposed for photodegradation of dye based on the trap experiment, where electron and holes were majorly responsible. BA peel derived photoactive-CD showed remarkable results concerning the photodegradation of CV (20 ppm in ~ 90 min) under sunlight illumination as compared to the dark conditions.