Piezocatalytic performance of Fe₂O₃−Bi₂MoO₆ catalyst for dye degradation

Abstract

A Fe₂O₃−Bi₂MoO₆ heterojunction was synthesized via a hydrothermal method. Scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, energy-dispersive X-ray, powder X-ray diffraction, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and ultra-violet−visible near-infrared spectrometry were performed to measure the structures, morphologies and optical properties of the as-prepared samples. The various factors that affected the piezocatalytic property of composite catalyst were studied. The highest rhodamine B degradation rate of 96.6% was attained on the 3% Fe₂O₃−Bi₂MoO₆ composite catalyst under 60 min of ultrasonic vibration. The good piezocatalytic activity was ascribed to the formation of a hierarchical flower-shaped microsphere structure and the heterostructure between Fe₂O₃ and Bi₂MoO₆, which effectively separated the ultrasound-induced electron–hole pairs and suppressed their recombination. Furthermore, a potential piezoelectric catalytic dye degradation mechanism of the Fe₂O₃−Bi₂MoO₆ catalyst was proposed based on the band potential and quenching effect of radical scavengers. The results demonstrated the potential of using Fe₂O₃−Bi₂MoO₆ nanocomposites in piezocatalytic applications.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

piezocatalysis / Fe₂O₃−Bi₂MoO₆ / dye decomposition / ultrasonic vibration

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 22272151) and Natural Science Foundation of Zhejiang Province (Grant No. LY16B030002).

Electronic Supplementary Material

Supplementary material is available in the online version of this article at https://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11705-022-2265-9 and is accessible for authorized users.

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