Facile synthesis of zwitterionic surfactant-assisted molybdenum oxide/reduced graphene oxide nanocomposite with enhanced photocatalytic and antimicrobial activities

Reduced graphene oxide (rGO) was synthesized by chemical reduction method and molybdenum oxide (MoO3) was synthesized by sol-gel method, separately. Molybdenum oxide/reduced graphene oxide (MoO3/rGO) nanocomposite was synthesized by sol-gel method followed by sonication method in the presence of zwitterionic surfactant, myristyl sulfobetaine (SB3-14) at its critical micelle concentration. The optical properties of nanocomposite were studied by calculating the bandgap. The average crystallite size of the nanocomposite was calculated as 22.16 nm using XRD. Direct allowed bandgap of MoO3/rGO nanocomposite was found 3.69 eV and its photocatalytic activity under the irradiation of sunlight showed 97.64% degradation against methylene blue. Antimicrobial activities were also checked against different bacterial strains.

Automated summary

Molybdenum oxide/reduced graphene oxide (MoO3/rGO) nanocomposite was synthesized using sol-gel and sonication methods, showing high photocatalytic degradation efficiency and antimicrobial activities.