A facile fabrication of Ag2O-Ag/ZnAl-oxides with enhanced visible-light photocatalytic performance for tetracycline degradation

• Published in: Applied clay science 2020-02, Vol.185, p.105413, Article 105413
• Main Authors: Shen, Jia-Chao, Zeng, Hong-Yan, Chen, Chao-Rong, Xu, Sheng
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Ag2O-Ag; Tetracycline reduction; Visible light; ZnAl-oxide
• ISSN: 0169-1317; 1872-9053
• DOI: 10.1016/j.clay.2019.105413

A facile and low-cost method to prepare novel Ag2O-Ag/LDO photocatalysts was demonstrated, where the Ag2O/Ag nanoparticles were decorated on the ZnAl oxide (LDO) supports. The LDO supports were obtained by calcining their ZnAl layered double hydroxide precursor (LDH) at different temperatures. The structure, composition, morphology and optical and electrochemical properties of the as-prepared Ag2O-Ag/LDO were characterized using various techniques. Under visible light irradiation, the Ag2O-Ag/LDO showed higher photoactivity and stability of tetracycline (TC) degradation than pure Ag2O-Ag. Especially, the Ag2O-Ag/LDO5 (Ag2O-Ag/LDO calcined at 500 °C) had the most excellent photoactivity with the highest rate constant k (0.0242 min−1), suggesting that the photocatalytic activity depended on the calcination temperature. The enhancement of the photocatalytic performance was attributed to the formation of the heterostructure between Ag2O/Ag and ZnO, the strong visible-light absorption and outstanding separation efficiency of photoinduced electron-hole pairs under visible light irradiation. •The novel Ag-Ag2O/ZnAl-oxide (Ag2O-Ag/LDO) photocatalysts were successfully prepared.•The photocatalytic performances depend on the temperature of calcining the support.•The formation of Ag2O/ZnO heterojunction promoted the generation and separation of the photogenerated electron-hole pairs.