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Fabrication and characterization of visible light-driven In2.77S4/In(OH)3 composite photocatalysts with excellent redox performance

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Abstract

The In2.77S4 microspheres had been firstly fabricated by using polyethylene glycol (PEG) as the morphological modifier and then used to hybridize with In(OH)3 nanocubes by a simply depositional method. The structure, optical properties, morphology, chemical compositions, and charge carrier behaviors of the as-prepared In2.77S4/In(OH)3 composites were characterized, respectively. The methyl orange, tetracycline, rhodamine B, and Cr(VI) dilute solution were selected to evaluate their photocatalytic activities. Experimental results showed that In(OH)3 nanocubes could improve the photocatalytic activity and recyclability of the In2.77S4 microspheres under the visible light irradiation. With the usage of In(OH)3 increased, the photocatalytic efficiency of the hybrids was firstly increased and then decreased. When the mass ratios of In2.77S4 to In(OH)3 were 6:2, it reached the maximum of 100% in 15 min for methyl orange, obviously higher than 67.4% of In2.77S4 and 1.1% of In(OH)3. Meanwhile, it could also oxidize 85.6% of tetracycline in 20 min, 97.8% of rhodamine B in 7.5 min, and reduce 92.9% of Cr(VI) in 30 min under the visible light irradiation. Moreover, it could still degrade 91.7% of methyl orange solution after 3 cycles, which was much higher than 40.7% of In2.77S4 microspheres. In addition, the possible mechanism of enhancing photocatalytic properties was proposed.

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Acknowledgments

This work was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation (No. 51778378) and Natural Science Foundation of Hebei Province, China (No. E2013210011).

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  1. Xiang-Feng Wu and Hui Li contributed equally to this work and share the first authorship.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Materials Science and Engineering, Hebei Provincial Key Laboratory of Traffic Engineering Materials, Shijiazhuang Tiedao University, 17 Northeast, Second Inner Ring, Shijiazhuang, 050043, China

    Xiang-Feng Wu, Hui Li, Jun-Zhang Su, Jia-Rui Zhang, Yan-Mei Feng, Jun-Cheng Pan, Ying Zhang, Li-Song Sun, Wei-Guang Zhang & Guo-Wen Sun

  2. School of Science, North University of China, Taiyuan, 030051, China

    Yan-Mei Feng

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  1. Xiang-Feng Wu
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  2. Hui Li
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Correspondence to Xiang-Feng Wu.

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Wu, XF., Li, H., Su, JZ. et al. Fabrication and characterization of visible light-driven In2.77S4/In(OH)3 composite photocatalysts with excellent redox performance. J Nanopart Res 20, 155 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11051-018-4257-8

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