Synthesis and Investigation of Template Effects on Nanoporous Bi2O3 Morphologies by Sol Gel Method as Photocatalysts for Degradation of Some Organic Dyes as Water Pollutants

Abstract

Effect of triethanolamine, n-octylamine, starch, polyethylene glycol and hexadecyltrimethylammonium bromide as template have been investigated on the formation of Bi2O3 prepared via sol gel method. The prepared catalysts were characterized using X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, Fourier transform infrared, UV–visible diffuse reflectance and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller techniques and subsequently used as photodegradation catalyst to purify contaminated water by Congo red and methylene blue as phenolic dyes. It was found that whereas Bi2O3-starch, Bi2O3-CTAB and Bi2O3-PEG have the most photodegradation effect on methylene blue under visible irradiation, Bi2O3-starch and Bi2O3-CTAB are the most active catalysts for Congo red under UV irradiation. In other word, the type of organic dyes, photocatalyst morphologies and templates are important factors on the photodegradation and adsorption phenomena.