Fabrication of efficient, magnetic graphene oxide nanocomposite for the enhanced photodegradation of organic dyes under visible light

Abstract

This study reports magnetic graphene oxide composite microspheres (MGO) were firstly synthesized via one step miniemulsion polymerization. α-FeOOH rods were then loaded onto MGO via a facile hydrothermal method to prepare α-FeOOH@MGO, which was served as the photocatalyst for the Fenton reaction. Subsequently, the properties of the resulting α-FeOOH@MGO were characterized by FT-IR, XRD, SEM, VSM and UV-vis DRS analysis methods. The influence of various parameters was investigated, such as dye type, dye concentration, H₂O₂ dosage, catalysts dosage and pH of MO solution during heterogeneous photo-Fenton processes. Under visible light irradiation, the degradation rate of MO, MB and CR could reach 99.96%, 98.47% and 99.97% in 40 min, respectively. Six cycle experiments confirmed that the α-FeOOH@MGO possessed a satisfied stability and recycling ability. In addition, the photocatalytic reaction mechanism was also revealed by the Mott-Schottky plot, band structure and trapping experiments of active species.

Graphical Abstract

Keywords:

• Nanocomposites
• dye wastewater
• photocatalysis
• magnetic separation
• mechanism

Declaration of interest statement

The authors claim that they have no known competing economic interests or personal relationships that may affect the work reported in this paper.

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Natural Science Foundation of China (52004234), the Opening Project of State Key Laboratory of Polymer Materials Engineering (Sichuan University) (Grant No. sklpme2020-4-14), the Cooperation Project between Southwest Petroleum University and Nanchong City (SXHZ047), the Science and Technology Project of Southwest Petroleum University (Nos. 2021JBGS07), the Sichuan Science and Technology Program (2021ZYCD005), and the Special project for the central government to guide the development of local science and technology in Sichuan Province (2021ZYD0099).