Deposition-precipitation preparation of Ag/Ag3PO4/WO3 nanocomposites for efficient Visible-light degradation of rhodamine B under strongly acidic/alkaline conditions.

ABSTRACT

A series of novel visible-light-driven Ag/Ag3PO4/WO3 (AAPW) Z-scheme heterostructures were fabricated using a facile deposition-precipitation method followed by photo-reduction without adding any surfactant. To explore more deeply about the photocatalytic activity of AAPW nanocomposites under neutral and strongly acidic/alkaline conditions, we investigated their photocatalytic rhodamine B (RhB) efficiency at different pH value that was controlled by adding HNO3 or NaOH aqueous solution. It was found that as-prepared AAPW photocatalysts showed enhanced photocatalytic RhB efficiency under neutral and even strongly acidic/alkaline environment. The process of charge carrier separation and transfer in the AAPW nanocomposites and Z-scheme mechanism for RhB degradation were described in sufficient detail based on systematical characterizations and measurements. The silver particles introduced to build AAPW Z-scheme structure should contribute to more efficient charge separation, resulting in enhanced photocurrent response and photocatalytic activity. We expect thatthis work will provide systematic study concerning Z-scheme Ag/Ag3PO4/WO3 structure, and fulfill the research about photodegrade activity of catalyst under strongly acidic/alkaline conditions.