Advanced nanostructured photocatalysts based on reduced graphene oxide-flower-like Bi2WO6 composites for an augmented simulated solar photoactivity activity

A simple hydrothermal process was proposed to prepare the flower-like Bi2WO6 architectures, and the as-synthesized Bi2WO6 photocatalysts were further processed with the prepared graphene oxide (GO) to form novel reduced graphene oxide (RGO)/Bi2WO6 composites. The nano-materials were characterized with the help of XRD, XPS, SEM, FTIR, UV-DRS, PL techniques to investigate their morphological, physical, optical, and photochemical properties. Photocatalytic performances of the pure flower-like Bi2WO6 architectures and RGO/Bi2WO6 composites were compared and evaluated through the degradation of ciprofloxacin hydrochloride (Cipro HCl) wastewater under the simulated visible light. It was found that the RGO/Bi2WO6 composites displayed enhanced visible light-driven photocatalytic activities. It might be that the RGO loading not only effectively suppressed the electron-hole recombination, but also increased the light absorption ability. The effects of operating condition involved in the photocatalytic process were further examined, and the cycle-stability experiment demonstrated that as-obtained 2% RGO/Bi2WO6 photocatalysts had good photocatalytic repeatability. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.