Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Photodegradation of methylene blue and Rose Bengal employing g-C3N4/ZnWO4 nanocatalysts under ultraviolet light irradiation

  • Research paper
  • Published:
Journal of Nanoparticle Research Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

In this research, urea-derived g-C3N4/ZnWO4 (ZnW-U) heterostructures have been synthesized through a simple and eco-friendly one-pot process. Morphology, structure, and composition of the prepared nanocomposites were ascertained using techniques such as XRD, FTIR, Raman, FESEM, and UV–Vis analysis. To investigate the photocatalytic performance of the as-synthesized heterostructures, organic pollutant methylene blue (MB) and Rose Bengal (RB) dyes were chosen as benchmark reactions, which revealed that the as-prepared g-C3N4/ZnWO4 heterostructures show remarkably improved photocatalytic efficacy for the decomposition of MB and RB dyes under ultraviolet (UV) light treatment. Concisely, the photocatalytic efficiency of the prepared nanocomposite under UV light irradiation showed an MB and RB degradation of more than 86% and 94%, respectively. The higher photocatalytic performance could be owing to the formation of heterojunction among graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) and ZnWO4, and efficient photoproduced electron–hole pairs separation. A plausible photocatalytic mechanism for the enhanced degradation performance of MB in presence of the as-synthesized photocatalysts is also suggested.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Scheme 1.
Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8
Fig. 9
Fig. 10
Fig. 11
Fig. 12
Fig. 13
Fig. 14
Fig. 15
Fig. 16
Scheme 2.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Dutta AK, Maji SK, Adhikary B (2014) Mater Res Bull 49:28–34

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Alahmadi N, Amin M, Mohamed R (2020) J Nanopart Res 22:1–14

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Ravi G, Veldurthi NK, Prasad MD, Muniratnam N, Prasad G, Vithal M (2013) J Nanopart Res 15:1–16

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Tahir MN (2021) J Saudi Chem Soc 25:101210

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Josephine GS, Ramachandran S, Sivasamy A (2015) J Saudi Chem Soc 19:549–556

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. El-Zomrawy A (2013) J Saudi Chem Soc 17:397–402

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Chaudhary K, Shaheen N, Zulfiqar S, Sarwar MI, Suleman M, Agboola PO, Shakir I, Warsi MF (2020) Synth Met 269:116526

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Kamal A, Tamboli JR, Nayak VL, Adil S, Vishnuvardhan M, Ramakrishna S (2014) Bioorg Med Chem 22:2714–2723

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Kamal A, Tamboli JR, Ramaiah MJ, Adil S, Pushpavalli S, Ganesh R, Sarma P, Bhadra U, Pal-Bhadra M (2013) Bioorg Med Chem 21:6414–6426

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Arslan I (2001) J Hazard Mater 85:229–241

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  11. Alharthi FA, Alghamdi AA, Alothman AA, Almarhoon ZM, Alsulaiman MF, Al-Zaqri N (2020) Crystals 10:441

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  12. Ali D, Ali H, Alarifi S, Kumar S, Serajuddin M, Mashih AP, Ahmed M, Khan M, Adil SF, Shaik M (2015) Arch Environ Contam Toxicol 68:543–552

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  13. Patil SS, Shinde VM (1988) Environ Sci Technol 22:1160–1165

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  14. Alharthi FA, Al-Zaqri N, Elmarghany A, Alghamdi AA, Alorabi AQ, Baghdadi N, Al-Shehri HS, Wahab R, Ahmad N (2020) J Mater Sci Mater El 31:11538–11547

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  15. Pouretedal HR, Norozi A, Keshavarz MH, Semnani A (2009) J Hazard Mater 162:674–681

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  16. Daneshvar N, Rasoulifard M, Khataee A, Hosseinzadeh F (2007) J Hazard Mater 143:95–101

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  17. Natarajan TS, Thampi KR, Tayade RJ (2018) Appl Catal B Environ. 227:296–311

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  18. Dumrongrojthanath P, Phuruangrat A, Doungarno K, Thongtem T, Patiphatpanya P, Thongtem S (2018) Ceram Int 44:S148–S151

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  19. Jia J, Huang W, Feng C, Zhang Z, Zuojiao K, Liu J, Jiang C, Wang Y (2019) J Alloys Compd 790:616–625

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  20. Babu B, Harish V, Koutavarapu R, Shim J, Yoo K (2019) J Ind Eng Chem 76:476–487

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  21. Mehta A, Mishra A, Basu S, Shetti NP, Reddy KR, Saleh TA, Aminabhavi TM (2019) J Environ Manage 250:109486

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  22. Reddy CV, Reddy IN, Koutavarapu R, Reddy KR, Kim D, Shim J (2020) Sol Energy 207:441–449

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Basavarajappa PS, Seethya BNH, Ganganagappa N, Eshwaraswamy KB, Kakarla RR (2018) ChemistrySelect 3:9025–9033

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  24. Reddy CV, Reddy IN, Ravindranadh K, Reddy KR, Shetti NP, Kim D, Shim J, Aminabhavi TM (2020) J Environ Manage 260:110088

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  25. Tavangar T, Karimi M, Rezakazemi M, Reddy KR, Aminabhavi TM (2020) Chem Eng J 385:123787

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  26. Kausor MA, Chakrabortty D (2020) J Nanopart Res 22:1–17

    Article  Google Scholar 

  27. Natarajan TS, Tayade RJ (2021) J Nanopart Res 23:1–15

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. Sriram G, Bendre A, Altalhi T, Jung H-Y, Hegde G, Kurkuri M (2022) Chemosphere 287:131976

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  29. Sriram G, Bendre A, Mariappan E, Altalhi T, Kigga M, Ching YC, Jung H-Y, Bhaduri B, and Kurkuri M (2021) Sustain Mater Technol e00378

  30. Adil SF, Assal ME, Shaik MR, Kuniyil M, AlOtaibi NM, Khan M, Sharif M, Alam MM, Al-Warthan A, Mohammed JA (2019) Catalysts 9:759

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  31. Khan M, Shaik MR, Adil SF, Kuniyil M, Ashraf M, Frerichs H, Sarif MA, Siddiqui MRH (2020) Al–Warthan A, and Labis JP. Sci Rep. 10:1–14

    Google Scholar 

  32. Alghamdi AA, Alshahrani AF, Khdary NH, Alharthi FA, Alattas HA, Adil SF (2018) Materials 11:578

    Article  Google Scholar 

  33. Khan M, Khan M, Al-Marri AH, Al-Warthan A, Alkhathlan HZ, Siddiqui MRH, Nayak VL, Kamal A, Adil SF (2016) Int J Nanomed 11:873

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  34. Assal ME, Shaik MR, Kuniyil M, Khan M, Al-Warthan A, Siddiqui MRH, Khan SM, Tremel W, Tahir MN, Adil SF (2017) RSC Adv 7:55336–55349

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  35. Shaik MR, Alam M, Adil SF, Kuniyil M, Al-Warthan A, Siddiqui MRH, Tahir MN, Labis JP, Khan M (2019) Materials 12:711

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  36. Hao Q, Chen T, Wang R, Feng J, Chen D, Yao W (2018) J Clean Prod 197:1222–1230

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  37. Li D, Wu Z, Xing C, Jiang D, Chen M, Shi W, Yuan S (2014) J Mol Catal A: Chem 395:261–268

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  38. Jung H, Pham T-T, Shin EW (2019) J Alloys Compd 788:1084–1092

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  39. Kumar S, Karthikeyan S, Lee AF (2018) Catalysts 8:74

    Article  Google Scholar 

  40. Khan MM, Adil SF, Al-Mayouf A (2015) J Saudi Chem Soc 19:462–464

    Article  Google Scholar 

  41. Jasrotia R, Kumar G, Batoo KM, Adil SF, Khan M, Sharma R, Kumar A, Singh VP (2019) Physica B Condens Matter 569:1–7

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  42. Rehman KMU, Riaz M, Liu X, Khan MW, Yang Y, Batoo KM, Adil SF, Khan M (2019) J Magn Magn Mater 474:83–89

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  43. Sultana S, Ali R, Kuniyil M, Khan M, Alwarthan A, Kishore D, Assal M, Prasad K, Ahmad N, Siddiqui MRH (2017) J Saudi Chem Soc 21:878–886

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  44. Gherab K, Al-Douri Y, Hashim U, Ameri M, Bouhemadou A, Batoo KM, Adil SF, Khan M, Raslan EH (2020) J Mater Sci Technol 9:857–867

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  45. Keereeta Y, Thongtem T, Thongtem S (2011) J Alloys Compd 509:6689–6695

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  46. Pereira PFdS, Gouveia A, Assis Md, De Oliveira R, Pinatti IM, Penha M, Gonçalves R, Gracia L, Andrés J, and Longo E (2018) PCCP 20;1923–1937

  47. Wang F, Li W, Gu S, Li H, Liu X, Wang M, Sustain ACS (2016) Chem Eng 4:6288–6298

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  48. Koutavarapu R, Babu B, Reddy CV, Yoo K, Cho M, Shim J (2020) J Mater Sci 55:1170–1183

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  49. Vu M-H, Sakar M, Nguyen C-C, Do T-O, Sustain ACS (2018) Chem Eng 6:4194–4203

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  50. He G, Fan H, Ma L, Wang K, Ding D, Liu C, Wang Z (2016) Mater Sci Semicond Process 41:404–410

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  51. Zhu Z, Zhou F, Zhan S, Huang N, He Q (2018) Appl Surf Sci 456:156–163

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  52. He X, Zou G, Xu Y, Zhu H, Jiang H, Jiang X, Xia W, Chen J, Wu J, Yang S (2018) Prog Nat Sci: Materials International 28:416–421

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  53. Kuniyil M, Kumar J, Adil SF, Shaik MR, Khan M, Assal ME, Siddiqui MRH, Al-Warthan A (2019) Catalysts 9:469

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  54. Zhu B, Xia P, Li Y, Ho W, Yu J (2017) Appl Surf Sci 391:175–183

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  55. Guo Q, Yang Q, Yi C, Zhu L, Xie Y (2005) Carbon 43:1386–1391

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  56. Groenewolt M, Antonietti M (2005) Adv Mater 17:1789–1792

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  57. Severo EDC, Abaide ER, Anchieta CG, Foletto VS, Weber CT, Garlet TB, Collazzo GC, Mazutti MA, Gündel A, and Kuhn RC (2016) Mater Res 19:781–785

  58. He X, Wu Z, Xue Y, Gao Z, Yang X (2019) RSC Adv 9:4635–4643

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  59. Kloprogge JT, Weier ML, Duong LV, Frost RL (2004) Mater Chem Phys 88:438–443

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  60. Van Minh N, Hung NM (2011) Mater Sci Appl 2:988–992

    Google Scholar 

  61. Fomichev V, Kondratov O (1994) Spectrochim Acta, Part A 50:1113–1120

    Article  Google Scholar 

  62. BoopathiRaja R, Parthibavarman M, Begum AN (2019) Vacuum 165:96–104

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  63. BoopathiRaja R, Parthibavarman M (2019) J Alloys Compd 811:152084

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  64. Joshi N, da Silva LF, Shimizu FM, Mastelaro VR, M’Peko J-C, Lin L, Oliveira ON (2019) Microchim Acta 186:1–9

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  65. Hosseini Z, Mortezaali A, Fardindoost S (2015) J Alloy Compd 628:222–229

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  66. Yao B, Peng C, Zhang W, Zhang Q, Niu J, Zhao J (2015) Appl Catal B Environ 174:77–84

    Article  Google Scholar 

  67. Chahal S, Kumar A, Kumar P (2020) Crystals 10:273

    Article  Google Scholar 

  68. Suresh M, Sivasamy A (2020) J Mol Liq 317:114112

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  69. Isai KA, Shrivastava VS, Appl SN (2019) Sci 1:1247

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  70. Raghavan N, Thangavel S, Venugopal G (2015) Mater Sci Semicond Process 30:321–329

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  71. Tran Thi VH, Pham TN, Pham TT, Le MC (2019) J Chem 2019:2979517

  72. Taheri-Ledari R, Valadi K, Gharibi S, and Maleki A (2020) Mater Res Bull 110946

  73. Fouda A, Salem SS, Wassel AR, Hamza MF, Shaheen TI (2020) Heliyon 6:e04896

    Article  Google Scholar 

  74. Prabhu YT, Sreedhar B (2020) Materials Today: Proceedings 26:31–35

    Google Scholar 

  75. Mohammed MK (2020) Optik 164867

  76. Adeleke J, Theivasanthi T, Thiruppathi M, Swaminathan M, Akomolafe T, Alabi A (2018) Appl Surf Sci 455:195–200

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  77. Sanad MF, Shalan AE, Bazid SM, Abdelbasir SM (2018) J Environ Chem Eng 6:3981–3990

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  78. Stanley R (2019) Optik 180:134–143

    Article  Google Scholar 

  79. Youssef A, Yakout S (2020) Opt Mater 107:110072

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  80. Chahar D, Taneja S, Bisht S, Kesarwani S, Thakur P, Thakur A, Sharma P. J. Alloys Compd 851:156878.

  81. Mitra M, Ghosh A, Mondal A, Kargupta K, Ganguly S, Banerjee D (2017) Appl Surf Sci 402:418–428

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  82. Kamaraj E, Somasundaram S, Balasubramani K, Eswaran MP, Muthuramalingam R, Park S (2018) Appl Surf Sci 433:206–212

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  83. Vidya C, Prabha MC, Raj MA (2016) Environ Nanotechnol Monit Manag 6:134–138

    Google Scholar 

  84. Chahal S, Rani N, Kumar A, Kumar P (2020) Vacuum 172:109075

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  85. Kumar SR, Abinaya C, Amirthapandian S, Ponpandian N (2017) Mater Res Bull 93:270–281

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  86. Maji SK, Dutta AK, Srivastava DN, Paul P, Mondal A, Adhikary B (2011) Polyhedron 30:2493–2498

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  87. Kaur J, Singhal S (2014) Physica B Condens Matter 450:49–53

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  88. Malik R, Tomer VK, Rana PS, Nehra S, Duhan S (2015) Mater Lett 154:124–127

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  89. Mukherjee N, Show B, Maji SK, Madhu U, Bhar SK, Mitra BC, Khan GG, Mondal A (2011) Mater Lett 65:3248–3250

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  90. Ameen S, Seo H-K, Akhtar MS, Shin HS (2012) Chem Eng J 210:220–228

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  91. Nagaraju G, Nagabhushana H, Suresh D, Anupama C, Raghu G, Sharma S (2017) Ceram Int 43:11656–11667

    Article  Google Scholar 

  92. Huang K, Hong Y, Yan X, Huang C, Chen J, Chen M, Shi W, Liu C (2016) CrystEngComm 18:6453–6463

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  93. Zhao W, Wang Y, Yang Y, Tang J, Yang Y (2012) Appl Catal Environ. 115:90–99

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

The authors extend their thanks to Researchers Supporting Project (Ref: RSP-2021/160), King Saud University (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia).

Author information

Author notes

  1. Fahad A. Alharthi and Hamdah S. Alanazi contributed equally.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry, College of Science, King Saud University, Riyadh, 11451, Saudi Arabia

    Fahad A. Alharthi, Hamdah S. Alanazi, Khalid Mohammed Alotaibi & Naushad Ahmad

Authors
  1. Fahad A. Alharthi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Hamdah S. Alanazi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Khalid Mohammed Alotaibi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Naushad Ahmad
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Fahad A. Alharthi.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

Publisher's note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Supplementary Information

Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.

Supplementary file1 (DOCX 2700 KB)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Alharthi, F.A., Alanazi, H.S., Alotaibi, K.M. et al. Photodegradation of methylene blue and Rose Bengal employing g-C3N4/ZnWO4 nanocatalysts under ultraviolet light irradiation. J Nanopart Res 24, 125 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11051-022-05510-7

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11051-022-05510-7

Keywords

Search

Navigation