Journal article

Diffused sunlight driven highly synergistic pathway for complete mineralization of organic contaminants using reduced graphene oxide supported photocatalyst

Sundaram Ganesh Babu, Ramalingam Vinoth, Bernaurdshaw Neppolian, Dionysios D Dionysiou, Muthupandian Ashokkumar

JOURNAL OF HAZARDOUS MATERIALS | ELSEVIER | Published : 2015

Abstract

Diffused sunlight is found to be an effective light source for the efficient degradation and mineralization of organic pollutant (methyl orange as a probe) by sono-photocatalytic degradation using reduced graphene oxide (rGO) supported CuO-TiO2 photocatalyst. The prepared catalysts are characterized by XRD, XPS, UV-vis DRS, PL, photoelectrochemical, SEM-EDS and TEM. A 10 fold synergy is achieved for the first time by combining sonochemical and photocatalytic degradation under diffused sunlight. rGO loading augments the activity of bare CuO-TiO2 more than two fold. The ability of rGO in storing, transferring, and shuttling electrons at the heterojunction between TiO2 and CuO facilitates the s..

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University of Melbourne Researchers

Grants

Awarded by SERB


Funding Acknowledgements

We acknowledge financial support from the SERB (SR/FT/CS-127/2011), DST, New Delhi, India. We also acknowledge Prof. Ick Soo Kim (Division of Frontier Fibers, Institute for Fiber Engineering (IFES), National Shinshu University, Ueda, Japan) for TEM and XPS analysis.