Ultrasonic-assisted preparation of plasmonic ZnO/Ag/Ag2WO4 nanocomposites with high visible-light photocatalytic performance for degradation of organic pollutants

In this work, plasmonic ternary ZnO/Ag/Ag2WO4 nanocomposites as efficient visible-light-driven photo catalysts prepared by a facile ultrasonic-irradiation method. The as-prepared samples were characterized by XRD, SEM, TEM, EDX, XPS, UV-vis DRS, FT-IR, and PL techniques. The photocatalytic performance of the prepared ZnO/Ag/Ag2WO4 nanocomposites were evaluated by photodegradations of rhodamine B, methylene blue, methyl orange, and fuchsine under visible-light irradiation. The optimal nanocomposite with 15 wt% of Ag/Ag2WO4 to ZnO showed the highest photocatalytic activity for RhB degradation, which is about 95 and 19 times higher than those of the Ag/Ag2WO4 and ZnO samples, respectively. The highly enhanced activity of the ZnO/Ag/Ag2WO4 (15%) nanocomposite was attributed to the surface plasmon resonance effect of metallic silver and the formation of heterojunctions between the counterparts, which effectively suppresses recombination of the photogenerated charge carriers. Lastly, the plasmon-enhanced photocatalytic mechanism associated with the ZnO/Ag/Ag2WO4 nanocomposites was discussed. (C) 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.