One-pot Synthesis of Carbon-doped TiO2 with Bimetallic Ni-Ag co-catalysts in Photodegradation of Methylene Blue under UV and Visible Irradiation

Abstract

Carbon modified-titanium dioxide (@C-TiO2) was prepared by one-pot procedure from TiCl4 and glucose under hydrothermal conditions at 150 ºC for 24 hours. The obtained @C-TiO2 was employed as support for Ni-Ag(3.0)@C-TiO2 nanocomposite (3.0 is the Ni/Ag molar ratio). The synthesized catalysts were characterized by means of XRD and UV-Vis DRS Spectroscopy. The XRD patterns of @TiO2 show the brookite as the main phase, meanwhile the main phase in the @C-TiO2, Ni-Ag(3.0)@TiO2 and Ni-Ag(3.0)@C-TiO2 nanocomposites were anatase. The band gap of the TiO2 sample slightly shifted to the visible range after the addition of C dopant or Ni-Ag(3.0) co-catalyst as indicated by UV-Vis DRS spectra. Ni-Ag(3.0)@C-TiO2 catalyst showed high photocatalytic activity for photodegradation of MB under both UV and visible irradiations at 60 ºC within 2 hours with maximum MB conversion of 67.5% and 54.1%, respectively. The synergistic action of C dopant or Ni-Ag(3.0) co-catalyst is believed to be important in the improvement of photocatalytic activity of @TiO2. Copyright © 2020 by Authors, Published by BCREC Group. This is an open access article under the CC BY-SA License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0).