Photo-Fenton like degradation of tetrabromobisphenol A with graphene-BiFeO3 composite as a catalyst

Graphene-BiFeO3 nanoscaled composites were prepared with a sol-gel method and evaluated as highly efficient photo-Fenton like catalyst under visible light irradiation. The graphene-BiFeO3 composite had a specific surface area of 35.07 m(2) g(-1), being considerably larger than that of BiFeO3 nanoparticles (7.50 m(2) g(-1)). The composite exhibited excellent visible light-Fenton like catalysis activity, being influenced by calcination temperature, graphene content and solution pH value. Under optimal conditions with visible light irradiation, the graphene-BiFeO3 composite yielded fast degradation of tetrabromobisphenol A with a apparent rate constant of 1.19 min(-1), which was 5.43 and 3.68 folds of that achieved by using BiFeO3 and the mixture of BiFeO3 and graphene, respectively. The significantly enhanced visible light-Fenton like catalytic properties of the graphene BiFeO3 composite in comparison with that of BiFeO3 was attributed to a large surface area, much increased adsorption capacity and the strong electron transfer ability of graphene in the composite. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.