Visible-light driven photocatalytic effectiveness for solid-state synthesis of ZnO/natural clay/TiO2 nanoarchitectures towards complete decolorization of methylene blue from aqueous solution

Abstract

Currently, there is a need for the treatment of industrial wastewater that generated as a result of the chemical treatments in textile industries. This untreated textile wastewater is one of the main environmental pollutants that people, animals, and plants are consumed directly or indirectly. Therefore, untreated industrial textile wastewater is the main cause of many serious illnesses. Textile wastewater that contains colorant dyes are currently the focus of the current research study owing to increasing the human and environmental considerations. Here, a visible-light driven photocatalytic system verified for model methylene blue (MB) decomposition, with nanocomposite based on ZnO/TiO2/natural clay nanocomposite. The letter was prepared using an efficient, facile and economic technique; solid-state synthesis. Strong photocatalyst was formed by the heterojunction between nanoparticles of ZnO/TiO2 semiconductors and delaminated layers of natural clay. The obtained data illustrated that the nanocomposite displayed an extensive dark adsorption and degradation rate. The resultant depicted that MB was completely degraded under normal conditions with a value nearly 100 % within 10 min. Under the photocatalytic sorption process and after five cycles, there is a tiny loss in efficiency photodegradation. In addition, the investigated nanocomposites of ZnO-NPs and natural clay contains 0.5 g or 0.7 g of TiO2-NPs has the ability to inhibit the growth of the tested microbes with 100 % of inhibition.