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Effect of the KOH chemical treatment on the optical and photocatalytic properties of BiVO4 thin films

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Abstract

In this work, we present the structural, optical and photocatalytic properties of BiVO4 thin films produced by a dual-magnetron sputtering process using both Bi2O3 (α-phase, 99.98 % purity) and V (99.9 % purity) targets under Ar/O2 atmosphere with a ratio of 18:2. The films were deposited varying the power applied to the targets to obtain stoichiometric films, and the monoclinic structure was achieved by post-deposition annealing. The dual process was chosen to better control the Bi/V ratio since Bi and V have very different sputtering yields. In particular, the influence of a chemical treatment using potassium hydroxide (KOH) on the optical properties and different dye discolorations (acid blue 113 and methyl orange) is discussed. The optical properties were studied by reflectance and transmittance spectroscopy, where the spectra were fitted to obtain the refractive index dispersion and the optical band gap of the BiVO4 as a function of the film structure, as determined by X-ray diffraction and Raman spectroscopy.

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Acknowledgements

The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Community Seven Framework Programme (FP7-NMP-2010-EU-MEXICO) and CONACYT under Grand Agreements Nos. 263878 and 125141 (BisNano), respectively. Economical support for this work was also provided by the PHOCSCLEEN project 318977. The authors acknowledged technical support from A. Tejeda, H. Zarco, C. Flores and A. Fonseca.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto de Investigaciones en Materiales, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, Mexico

    R. Mirabal-Rojas, O. Depablos-Rivera, J. C. Medina, M. Bizarro, J. Perez-Alvarez & S. E. Rodil

  2. Posgrado en Ciencia e Ingeniería de Materiales, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City, Mexico

    R. Mirabal-Rojas, O. Depablos-Rivera & J. C. Medina

  3. Department of Applied Science and Technology (DISAT), Politecnico di Torino, Torino, Italy

    S. M. Thalluri

  4. Laboratoire de Physique de la Matière Condensée, Université de Picardie Jules Verne, Amiens, France

    A. Zeinert

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  1. R. Mirabal-Rojas
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Correspondence to R. Mirabal-Rojas.

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Mirabal-Rojas, R., Depablos-Rivera, O., Thalluri, S.M. et al. Effect of the KOH chemical treatment on the optical and photocatalytic properties of BiVO4 thin films. Appl. Phys. A 122, 325 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00339-016-9821-4

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