Coupling effect of Fe-doped Co3O4 nanoparticles with SrTiO3 nanotubes on the high-efficiency photocatalytic activities of basic violet 16 dye degradation and H2 evolution

Abstract

The photocatalytic activity of semiconductors can be enhanced by doping with metal and/or nonmetal elements and coupling them with other semiconductors. Herein, highly ordered SrTiO3 nanotubes (NTs) and Fe-doped Co3O4 nanoparticles (NPs) were fabricated via the liquid phase deposition (LPD) process and the sol-gel method, respectively. Fe-doped Co3O4 NPs were assembled on the surface of SrTiO3 NTs to form heterostructured nanocomposites (NCs). The formation mechanism of SrTiO3 NTs and SrTiO3/Fe:Co3O4 NC was proposed, and the photocatalytic activity of the products was analyzed using basic violet 16 (BV16) dye as the pollutant and H2 evolution under visible light irradiation. The results showed that the SrTiO3/Fe:Co3O4 NC has the highest photocatalytic performance, with degradation rate of BV16 and H2 production rate of 1718 μmol.g-1.h-1, which was 13.2 and 2.8 times that of SrTiO3 NTs, respectively. The enhanced photocatalytic activity could be principally attributed to the improvement of charge separation resulting from the effects of doping Co3O4 NPs with Fe ions and their coupling with SrTiO3 NTs. The outstanding results using the SrTiO3/Fe:Co3O4 heterojunction exhibited its potential for the BV16 degradation and H2 production in environmental applications.