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The fast degradation for tetracycline over the Ag/AgBr/BiOBr photocatalyst under visible light

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Abstract

A series of Ag/AgBr/BiOBr photocatalysts with different weight contents of Ag/AgBr were successfully constructed via a simple precipitation method in 80 °C water bath. Photocatalysts were characterized by XRD, XPS, SEM, TEM, N2 Adsorption-Desorption (BET), and UV–Vis Diffuse Reflectance Spectroscopy (DRS). Compared with BiOBr and Ag/AgBr, all the composite photocatalysts show the prominent photocatalytic activity for the degradation of tetracycline (TC). Especially, 1:5Ag/AgBr/BiOBr (20%) has the highest reaction rate constant (kapp = 0.20 min−1). Moreover, according to the results of radical scavengers runs, ·OH and h+ acted as the main reactive species in the degradation process. Based on above, a possible photocatalytic mechanism for organics degradation over Ag/AgBr/BiOBr was proposed. Interestingly, the redox cycle between O2/·O2− and Br−/Br0 assisted with the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) effect of silver dramatically promotes the separation and transfer of electron–hole pairs, and improves the photocatalytic activity of the as-obtained composite samples.

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Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge funding for this work from AnHui Province Key Laboratory of Chemistry for Inorganic/Organic Hybrid Functionalized Materials, the National Natural Science Foundation of China (21171002), and Anhui Provincial Natural Science Foundation (1708085MB37). And this work is completed under the assistance and help of the Song sun professor.

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  1. School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Anhui University, Hefei, 230601, China

    Wanrong Zhu, Jimei Song, Xule Wang, Yun Lu, Gang Hu & Jie Yang

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  1. Wanrong Zhu
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  2. Jimei Song
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Correspondence to Jimei Song.

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Zhu, W., Song, J., Wang, X. et al. The fast degradation for tetracycline over the Ag/AgBr/BiOBr photocatalyst under visible light. J Mater Sci: Mater Electron 32, 26465–26479 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10854-021-07024-9

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