Construction of leaf-like g-C3N4/Ag/BiVO4 nanoheterostructures with enhanced photocatalysis performance under visible-light irradiation

The ternary heterostructured g-C3N4/Ag/BiVO4 photocatalyst was successfully fabricated by a facile in situ precipitation method. The as-prepared g-C3N4/Ag/BiVO4 heterostructures included g-C3N4 and Ag nanoparticles (NPs) assembling on the surface of leaf-like BiVO4 nanostructures. The g-C3N4/Ag/BiVO4 composite exhibited higher photocatalytic activity than pure g-C3N4, BiVO4, Ag/BiVO4 and g-C3N4/BiVO4. The enhanced photocatalytic performance could be attributed to an efficient separation of electron-hole pairs through a ternary composite system, in which Ag nanoparticles acted as electron sinks. In addition, the quenching effects of different scavengers showed that the reactive O-2(center dot-) and (OH)-O-center dot play the major role in the Rh B decolorization. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.