Tartaric acid enhanced CuFe2O4-catalyzed heterogeneous photo-Fenton-like degradation of methylene blue

CuFe2O4 particles were obtained by sol-gel process and characterized by XRD, SEM and EDS. The effects of tartaric acid (TA) on the degradation of methylene blue (MB) were studied in the presence of CuFe2O4 and H2O2 under light irradiation. The results showed that introducing TA enhanced MB decolorization rate from 52.0% to 92.1% within 80 min. The contribution of superoxide anions (center dot O-2(-)) was only 10% and the contribution of hydroxyl radical (center dot OH) was around 88%. For H2O2-CuFe2O4-photo system, in the presence (or absence) of TA, the dynamic change of center dot OH suggested that the addition of TA could promote the generation of hydroxyl radicals. The enhanced effect of TA in TA-H2O2-CuFe2O4-photo system could be attributed to its own structure and the dissolved metal ions of the catalyst surface. In addition, a reasonable mechanism for the complex system was elucidated.