Lithium-doped SnO2@CeO2 nanoparticles for highly photodegradation of Rhodamine B dye upon visible light irradiation

Abstract

Regarding to the sustainability and green environment, many researchers have devoted to address the issues of chemical toxicity toward human and earth. This paper reports the fabrication of heterostructures comprised of tin oxide (SnO2) and cerium oxide (CeO2) by a facile co-precipitation method. For the first time, the obtained SnO2@CeO2 nanostructures were modified with lithium dopant with different mole ratios. The fabricated bare SnO2, SnO2@CeO2, and Li–SnO2@CeO2 nanostructures were investigated by X-ray diffractometer (XRD), UV-visible spectrophotometer (UV–VIS), Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR), and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The heterostructure preparation of the SnO2@CeO2 sample was verified by XRD and FT-IR analyses. The XRD results showed the tetragonal and cubic phases related to the SnO2 and CeO2, respectively. The suppression in bandgap from 2.51 eV to 2.22 eV on Li was estimated from Tauc plots obtained from the UV-VIS curve. Also, the Li–SnO2@CeO2 nanocomposite, when utilized as a catalyst for the degradation of Rhodamine B (RhB) during light irradiation, demonstrates a superior photodegradation performance of 92%, which is higher than all other fabricated catalysts.