Abstract
Photocatalytic degradation of pollutants is one of the cleanest technologies for environmental remediation. Herein, we prepared NiO/NiTiO3 heterostructure nanofiber (200 nm) films by electrospinning and high temperature heat treatment, using nickel acetate and tetrabutyltitanate as nickel and titanium sources, respectively. The NiO/NiTiO3 heterostructure has advantages of good photodegradation rate constant and stability. By controlling the temperature, we can optimize the phase composition of these nanofibers for better photocatalytic performance. Based on our findings of the Rhodamine B degradation results, the best performance was obtained with 10% NiO and 90% NiTiO3; 92.9% of the Rhodamine B (5 mg/L) was degraded after reaction under full spectrum irradiation for 60 min. More importantly, the repeating test showed that these nanofiber films can remain active and stable after multiple cycles. The mechanisms of the photocatalysis reactions were also discussed. This demonstration provides a guideline in designing a new photocatalyst that we hope will serve the environmental needs for this and the coming century.
Highlights
As our society and the economy prosper, the amount of pollutants discharged increases rapidly and causes serious environmental problems
As the temperature increased to 800 ◦ C, a distinct nickel oxide (NiO) diffraction peak appears, indicating a mixture of NiTiO3 and NiO
The three diffraction peaks at 37.2◦, 43.3◦, and 62.8◦ corresponding to NiO (111), (200), (220) crystal plane, and the remaining diffraction peaks corresponding to (012), (104), (110), (113), (014), (116), (018), (300) planes of NiTiO3, respectively
Summary
As our society and the economy prosper, the amount of pollutants discharged increases rapidly and causes serious environmental problems. The objective is to expand their photoresponse range, thereby improving their photocatalytic efficiency Examples of this approach include black TiO2−x and nitrogen-doped. Investigations of Bi2 O3 /BiWO6 , AgI/BiOI, and TiO2 /WO3 showed that the heterojunction band structures in these materials can effectively inhibit electron-hole recombination and improve photocatalytic performance [16,17,18]. Based on the success of these four approaches, we have chosen composite heterostructures owing to the synergistic improvement of photocatalyst performance efficiency by both expanding the photoresponse range of wide bandgap semiconductors and suppressing the rapid recombination of photogenerated carriers. The NiO/NiTiO3 p-n junction nano-structure and its photocatalytic properties is rarely reported. NiO/NiTiO3 composite nanofiber membrane material formed by electrospinning combined with in situ heat treatment. The NiO/NiTiO3 heterojunction model is carried out to clarify the underlying mechanism of photocatalytic performance improvement
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