La3+ substituted BiFeO3-a proficient nano ferrite photo-catalyst under the application of visible light

Abstract

Photo-catalysis for muliferroic nanostructures has pervasive applications to solve the existing environmental issues and green energy issues of society. In the present paper, we examined the effect of La3+ (x = 0.04, 0.08, 0.12) doping on photo-catalysis and multiferroic applications of Bi1-xLaxFeO3 (L1, L2 & L3), which were synthesized via sol–gel methodology. The L1, L2 & L3 samples were characterized via XRD, FESEM (field emission scanning electron microscopy), UV–visible spectrometer, Impedance spectroscopy, Current-voltage characteristics, P-E, VSM, Photo-catalysis for degradation of MB dye. The surface area is found to be reasonably high in the range of 7.6–12.1 m2/g. The maximum value of current density is found to be 2.52, 2.12 and 1.56 µA-cm−2, respectively, for L1, L2 & L3. The dielectric constant (ε′) was measured for all the samples with variation of frequency (10 Hz to 5 MHz) at selected temperatures (300 K to 573 K). The AC conductivities (σac) of the samples are increasing with the function of frequency and temperature. The photocatalytic degradation efficiencies were enlarged from 60.81% to 78.82% with the substitution of La3+ in BFO. Additionally, the ferroelectric and magnetic responses were recorded which are to be significantly influenced via La3+ doping and saturation polarization (Ps) and saturation magnetization (Ms) values are found to be increased from 0.41 to 0.65 µC/Cm2 and 0.66 to 1.14 emu/gm and, respectively.