Preparation of silver/graphene/polymer hybrid microspheres and the study of photocatalytic degradation

Three-dimensional silver/graphene/polymer hybrid microspheres were prepared to depress the aggregation of two-dimensional graphene. Graphene oxide (GO) sheets were successfully wrapped on the surface of amine-functionalized polystyrene-poly (glycidyl methacrylate) (PS-PGMA) microspheres (similar to 3 mu m in diameter) to form graphene oxide/amino-microsphere (GO/AMS) core-shell structure. Subsequently, the wrapped GO sheets were reduced by using hydrazine hydrate as the reducing agents, meanwhile decorated with silver nanoparticles on the wrinkled surface to form Ag-rGO/AMS hybrid microspheres with monodisperse distributions in shape and diameter. The resulting materials were characterized by power X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscope, Raman spectra, and ultraviolet-visible (UV-vis) absorption spectra. Since Ag nanoparticles behave surface plasmon resonance effect and rGO structure can improve the separation of photogenerated electrons and holes, the Ag-rGO/AMS composites present good photocatalytic activities for the degradation of methylene blue (MB) as 93 % MB were degraded after 2.5 h under irradiation.