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One-dimensional porous Ag/AgBr/TiO2 nanofibres with enhanced visible light photocatalytic activity

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Abstract

One-dimensional (1D) Ag/AgBr/TiO2 nanofibres (NFs) have been successfully fabricated by the one-pot electrospinning method. In comparison with bare TiO2 NFs and Ag/AgBr/PVP (polyvinylpyrrolidone) NFs, the 1D Ag/AgBr/TiO2 NFs photocatalyst exhibits much higher photocatalytic activity in the degradation of a commonly used dye, methylene blue (MB), under visible light. The photocatalytic removal efficiency of MB over Ag/AgBr/TiO2 NFs achieves almost 100 % in 20 min. The photocatalytic reaction follows the first-order kinetics and the rate constant (k) for the degradation of MB by Ag/AgBr/TiO2 NFs is 5.2 times and 6.6 times that of Ag/AgBr/PVP NFs and TiO2 NFs, respectively. The enhanced photocatalytic activity is ascribed to the stronger visible light absorption, more effective separation of photogenerated electron-hole pairs, and faster charge transfer in the long nanofibrous structure. The Ag/AgBr/TiO2 NFs maintain a highly stable photocatalytic activity due to its good structural stability and the self-stability system of Ag/AgBr. The mechanisms for photocatalysis associated with Ag/AgBr/TiO2 NFs are proposed. The degradation of MB in the presence of scavengers reveals that h+ and •O −2 significantly contribute to the degradation of MB.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Chemo/Biosensing and Chemometrics, Hunan University, Changsha, 410082, China

    Ming-Yue Ding, De-Shui Meng, Cheng-Bin Liu & Sheng-Lian Luo

  2. Hunan Provincial Key Laboratory for Cost-Effective Utilization of Fossil Fuel Aimed at Reducing Carbon Dioxide Emissions, Hunan University, Changsha, 410082, China

    Ming-Yue Ding, De-Shui Meng, Yan-Hong Tang, Cheng-Bin Liu & Sheng-Lian Luo

  3. College of Materials Science and Engineering, Hunan University, Changsha, 410082, China

    Yan-Hong Tang

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  1. Ming-Yue Ding
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  2. De-Shui Meng
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  3. Yan-Hong Tang
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  4. Cheng-Bin Liu
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  5. Sheng-Lian Luo
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Correspondence to Yan-Hong Tang or Cheng-Bin Liu.

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Ding, MY., Meng, DS., Tang, YH. et al. One-dimensional porous Ag/AgBr/TiO2 nanofibres with enhanced visible light photocatalytic activity. Chem. Pap. 69, 1411–1420 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1515/chempap-2015-0151

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