Ferrite (Fe) Doping in Strontium Titanate (SrTi_1-xFe_xO₃) to Improve Photocatalytic Activity

Abstract

This research investigated the Fe doping effects on the Strontium Titanate (SrTiO3) structure to improve its photocatalytic activity. The so-called Fe-doped STO photocatalysts with a stoichiometry formula of SrTi1-xFexO3 (x = 0, 0.01, and 0.05) were successfully fabricated using the coprecipitation method. The XRD characterization confirmed the formation of STO, SrTi0.99Fe0.01O3, and SrTi0.95Fe0.05O3 photocatalysts and the shrinkage crystallite size due to increasing Fe content. The FTIR characterization supported the XRD results, where all samples revealed Sr-Ti-O bonds with no observed Fe-O bonds indicating the successful fabrication and doping. The photocatalytic activity was examined by the degradation of Methylene Blue (MB) dye under UV light for 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 irradiation times, and the absorbance was determined using a Spectrophotometer instrument. All samples have successfully degraded MB dye where the %degradation linearly increased with longer irradiation times. The results further exhibited that the SrTi0.95Fe0.05O3 sample had the highest %degradation at 75.3% while SrTi0.99Fe0.01O3 samples achieved the highest kinetic rate at 0.2557 min-1. All Fe-doped samples revealed better photocatalytic activity than the undoped STO, proving that Fe doping could improve the photocatalytic activity of SrTiO3.