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One-pot synthesis of lightly doped Zn1−x Cu x O and Au–Zn1−x Cu x O with solar light photocatalytic activity in liquid phase

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Abstract

We report on the facile and low-temperature one-pot chemical synthesis of lightly doped Zn1−x Cu x O and hybrid Au–Zn1−x Cu x O photocatalysts with low Cu molar content (0 < x < 0.7%) using 1,3-propanediol polyol simultaneously as solvent, reducing and a stabilizing agent, without any final thermal treatment. The photocatalysts have been characterized by X-ray diffraction, N2 adsorption study, UV–vis diffuse reflectance spectroscopy, inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectroscopy, and transmission electron microscopy. The lightly doped hybrid Au–Zn1−x Cu x O photocatalysts consisted in faceted quasi-spherical large-size Au nanoparticle cores surrounded by closely packed small-size Zn1−x Cu x O nanoparticles. Taking the photocatalytic degradation of Diuron under solar light as liquid-phase test reaction, the lightly doped Au–Zn1−x Cu x O hybrid photocatalysts with optimized x = 0.09% Cu content showed strongly enhanced photocatalytic activity when compared to the bare ZnO counterpart. The observed 16-fold higher degradation rate constant resulted jointly from the light doping of ZnO with Cu to form Zn1−x Cu x O photocatalyst and further from the addition of gold nanoparticles allowing interfacial oxide-to-metal electron transfer within the hybrid Au–Zn1−x Cu x O photocatalyst.

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Acknowledgements

Anis Fkiri gratefully acknowledges the support of the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research of Tunisia. The work was supported by the French Agence Nationale de la Recherche under the reference ANR-13-ECOT-010. K. Parkhomenko (ICPEES) is thanked for helping in some porosimetry measurements.

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  1. Unité de Recherche Synthèse et Structure de Nanomatériaux UR11 ES30, Faculté des Sciences de Bizerte, Université de Carthage, 7021 Jarzouna, Bizerte, Tunisia

    Anis Fkiri, Amine Mezni & Leila-Samia Smiri

  2. Institut de Chimie et Procédés pour l’Energie, l’Environnement et la Santé (ICPEES), CNRS, University of Strasbourg, 25 rue Becquerel, 67087, Strasbourg, France

    Marisa Rico Santacruz, Valérie Keller & Nicolas Keller

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  1. Anis Fkiri
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Fkiri, A., Santacruz, M.R., Mezni, A. et al. One-pot synthesis of lightly doped Zn1−x Cu x O and Au–Zn1−x Cu x O with solar light photocatalytic activity in liquid phase. Environ Sci Pollut Res 24, 15622–15633 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-017-9067-5

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