The influence of experimental conditions on photocatalytic degradation of methylene blue using titanium dioxide particle

In this research, the photocatalytic degradation of methylene blue (MB) as a dye pollutant was investigated in the presence of commercial TiO2 particles. The physical and optical characteristics of commercial TiO2 were examined by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET), and UV diffuse reflection spectroscopy (UV-DRS) techniques. In addition, the influence of different operating parameters such as catalyst loading, pH value, and temperature on the photodegradation efficiency was evaluated. The results showed that the commercial TiO2 had an anatase phase with a surface area of 9.85 m(2)/g and a pore size of 85 ; its absorbance spectrum was found to be 388 nm in the UV range involving a band gap of 3.2 eV. Besides, the optimized conditions for the highest photocatalytic activity of commercial TiO2 were 0.7 g/L of TiO2 catalyst and pH 3.0 under 50 degrees C of temperature, which acheived similar to 99% of MB removal.