Phyto-mediated hydrothermal synthesis of NiFe2O4 as photocatalyst in tetracycline photodegradation

Abstract

Tetracycline is one of the most important compounds in pharmaceutical industry, furthermore the controlling tetracycline in wastewater is important aspect for sustainable pharmaceutical industry. This study explores a photocatalytic degradation approach for the tetracycline removal by using magnetic nanomaterial of NiFe2O4 nanoparticles as photocatalyst. As a strategy in green chemistry approach, hydrothermal synthesis by using plant extract of Aloe vera extract was performed. Different techniques such x-ray diffraction (XRD), x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), UV–Visible spectrophotometry (UV-DRS) and magnetism analysis have been performed to characterize the sample. From TEM identification, the irregular shapes of NiFe2O4 NPs with particle size ranging at 5–40 nm was produced, and from XRD analysis, the crystallite size of the sample is 39.2 nm. The material demonstrates superparamagnetic behavior, and has the band gap energy of 1.84 eV. The photocatalytic activity assessment of the NiFe2O4 showed the degradation efficiency of about 75% and 65.53% under UV and visible lights, respectively. The easiness in separation of the rest photocatalyst supports the recoverability and stability until 5th cycle of usage with insignificant change of degradation efficiency.