Visible Light Responsive Nickel and Sulphur Co-Doped TiO2 Mesoporous Nanomaterial for the Degradation of Orange-II Dye and Antibacterial Activity on Escherichia coli

Abstract

Nickel and sulfur co-doped TiO2 photocatalyst were prepared by using sol-gel method with dopants precursors of nickel nitrate and thiourea. Prepared samples were characterized by XRD, UV-Vis-DRS, TEM, BET, FT-IR and SEM-EDX. These characterization and experimental results revealed that there is a formation of anatase phase, decreased band gap 2.62 eV for NIST-2, small particle size 7.3 nm and high surface area 142.62 m2/g. The FT-IR frequency shift for Ti-O-Ti was observed from 569 cm-1 to 460-560 cm-1 for co-doped TiO2. The efficiency of photocatalytic and antibacterial was evaluated by degradation of Orange-II dye and Escherichia coli (MTCC-443) respectively. The complete degradation of Orange-II was achieved in 120 min at optimum reaction parameters for NIST-2 at pH-3, catalyst dosage-100 mg/L and initial dye concentration at 10 mg/L.