Synthesis, characterization and silver/copper-nitrogen substitutional effect on visible light driven photocatalytic performance of sodium hexatitanate nanostructures

摘要

BACKGROUNDThe large-scale organic pollutants discharged from various industries tend to persist in aquatic habitats and pose a serious threat to ecological and human health. Photocatalysis has proven to be an efficient tool to detoxify such contaminants present in water. For effective utilization of abundant and untapped sunlight, a photocatalyst should possess good visible light response. In addition, an efficient catalyst should restrain the recombination of e(-)/h(+) pairs. In this context, a series of visible light driven photocatalysts were prepared by substituting both cation (Cu2+/Ag+) and anion (N3-) into Na2Ti6O13 (NTO) by simple ion exchange and solid state methods, respectively.