Synthesis and photocatalytic performance of Ag-TiVOX nanocomposite

A silver, vanadium and silver/vanadium doped titanium dioxide (TiO2, Ag-TiO2, V-TiO2 and Ag-TiVOX) nanocomposite photocatalyst was achieved via a modify sol–gel and hydrothermal method. Structural analysis by X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) depicted the lattice fringes for both anatase and rutile in its crystalline phase in the synthesized nanocomposites. Surface areas (SBET) analysis shows that surface area of synthesized Ag-TiVOX is 46.01 m2/g, compare to TiO2 64.75 m2/g, Ag-TiO2 61.33 m2/g and V-TiO2 62.73 m2/g. Optical absorption results demonstrated by UV–Visible Spectroscopy (UV–Vis) shows that the effects of Ag and V doping was a shift in spectrum to the visible light region, enhancing the visible light absorption capacity of the synthesized photocatalyst. The optical absorption of Ag-TiVOX achieved a reduced bandgap energy of 2.2 eV, as compared to Ag-TiO2 (2.8 eV), V-TiO2 (2.3 eV) and TiO2 (2.9 eV). Morphological characterization by Transition Electron Microscope (TEM) and Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM), depicting a cluster composed of spherical aggregates particles of non-uniform diameter nanoparticles with particle size ranging between 10 and 50 nm. Synthesized Ag-TiVOx demonstrated remarkable photocatalytic capabilities under visible light irradiation, as 99.83 percent of methylene blue (MB) degradation was accomplished during the first 15 min. Impact of Ag and V doping of TiO2 showed enhancement in the photocatalytic activity, reporting excellent removal rates and achieving well desirable decline in the band gap energy.