Photodecomposition and adsorption of hazardous organic pollutants by Ce-doped ZnO@Ce-doped TiO2-N/S-dual doped RGO ternary nano-composites photocatalyst for water remediation

Abstract

In this research, I found that the doping of ZnO@TiO2 core−shell and reduced graphene oxide (RGO) by rare earth cerium ion (Ce4+/Ce3+) and nitrogen (N) and sulfur (S) dual heteroatom is effective way to improve the photocatalytic decomposition of hazardous organic pollutants (phenol, bisphenol and methylene blue (MB)) in the water under visible light irradiation. The 0.1 mol% Ce/ZnO@0.1 mol% Ce/TiO2-N/S/5 wt% RGO, 0.1 mol% Ce/ZnO@0.1 mol% Ce/TiO2-5 wt% RGO, 0.1 mol% Ce/TiO2-N/S/5 wt% RGO, TiO2-N/S/5 wt% RGO and0.1 mol% Ce/ZnO@0.1 mol% Ce/TiO2 ternary and binary nano-composites photocatalyst were synthesised via a simple sol–gel route. Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction (XRD), Photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with an energy dispersive X-ray (EDX), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), UV–visible diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS), and Brunauer−Emmett−Teller (BET) analysis were used to characterize the fabricated nano-photocatalyst samples. The N/S/dual-doped RGO nano-sheets were fabrication by a facile hydrothermal route using cysteine as precursor for both N and S heteroatoms. Furthermore, cysteine can simultaneously act as a reducing agent of GO. The 0.1 mol% Ce/ZnO@0.1 mol% Ce/TiO2-N/S/5 wt% RGO exhibited high photodegradation of various hazardous organic pollutants under visible light irradiation.