Efficient, recyclable, and affordable daylight induced Cu/Cu2O/CuI photocatalyst via an inexpensive iodine sublimation process
- Authors
- Uthirakumar, Periyayya; Devendiran, M.; Kuznetsov, Andrej Yu; Kim, Gyu Cheol; Lee, In-Hwan
- Issue Date
- 30-1월-2021
- Publisher
- ELSEVIER
- Keywords
- Daylight photocatalyst; Nanocrystalline materials; Rhodamine dye; Flexible substrates; Cu/Cu2O/CuI; Sublimation
- Citation
- APPLIED SURFACE SCIENCE, v.537
- Indexed
- SCIE
SCOPUS
- Journal Title
- APPLIED SURFACE SCIENCE
- Volume
- 537
- URI
- https://scholar.korea.ac.kr/handle/2021.sw.korea/50049
- DOI
- 10.1016/j.apsusc.2020.147007
- ISSN
- 0169-4332
- Abstract
- The invention of an efficient, recyclable, and affordable daylight induced photocatalyst is highly desirable, for example to enhance the sustainability in industrial sectors requiring wastewater treatments. In the present paper, a facile and inexpensive iodine sublimation process was developed to prepare freestanding and flexible Cu/ Cu2O/CuI sheets to use as daylight photocatalysts capable to degrade toxic pollutants continuously without creating secondary pollution issues. The structural, chemical, and electronic properties of the Cu/Cu2O/CuI nanostructures were systematically investigated. In particular, intriguing hierarchical structures were observed in form of the 20-30 nm CuI nanoparticles self-assembled into the similar to 400-500 nm sized CuI nanoclusters. Indeed, similar to 92% of the Rhodamine B - often referred as RhB - dye degradation was readily achieved, and the efficiency was controlled simply by adjusting the number of sheets used. Importantly, in contrast with the conventional nanoparticle photocatalysts, the free-standing and flexible Cu/Cu2O/CuI sheets demonstrated excellent recyclability and versatility of handling. Moreover, potential mechanisms for suppressing the recombination of the photogenerated carriers were discussed. As a result, combining the fundamental data and the practically achieved results, the freestanding and flexible Cu/Cu2O/CuI nanostructures are suitable candidates for an industrial upscaling as daylight activated photocatalysts for the wastewater treatment.
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