Gadolinium doped tin dioxide nanoparticles: an efficient visible light active photocatalyst

A review on TiO2/SnO2 heterostructures as a photocatalyst for the degradation of dyes and organic pollutants

Industrialization, civilization and human activities have all grown steadily in recent years. As a result, small and large industries discharge many organic pollutants into the environment and contribute to environmental pollution. These compounds are quite stable and challenging to break down over time, posing a long-term risk. The heterogeneous advanced oxidation processes technology has gained tremendous attention. It depends on the light-induced formation of e^-/h⁺ pairs, which combine with water and aqueous oxygen to generate highly reactive hydroxyl radicals that degrade the organic pollutants in a solution and convert them ultimately into non-toxic products. In this paper, the synergetic impact of TiO₂-SnO₂ coupling with other semiconductor materials and their photodegradation performance on toxic contaminants in an aqueous medium has been reviewed. In addition, multiple approaches for the synthesis of TiO₂-SnO₂ photocatalysts have been discussed. Among them, hydrothermal, sol-gel, electrospinning, precipitation and even their combination are extensively used to synthesize various forms of nanostructures. These techniques demonstrate better tunability for visible absorption, suppression of e^-/h⁺ pair recombination and enhanced e^-/h⁺ separation to improve photocatalytic performance. This paper also summarises the role of different operating factors such as catalyst loading, pH, pollutants variation concentration, various light sources and oxidizing agents on the photodegradation of organic pollutants.

Rare earth doped metal oxide nanoparticles for photocatalysis: a perspective

Metal oxides are well-known materials that have been considered as the prominent photocatalysts. Photocatalysis is a promising way to address the environmental issues which are caused by fossil fuel the combustion and industrial pollutants. Lot of efforts such as doping of metal oxides with metals, non-metals have been made to enhance their photocatalytic activity. More specifically, in this review we have discussed detailed synthesis procedures of rare earth doped metal oxides performed in the past decades. The advantage of doping metal oxides with rare earth metals is that they readily combine with functional groups due to the 4f vacant orbitals. Moreover, doping rare earth metals causes absorbance shift to the visible region of the electromagnetic spectrum which results to show prominent photocatalysis in this region. The effect of rare earth doping on different parameters of metal oxides such as band gap and charge carrier recombination rate has been made in great details. In perspective section, we have given a brief description about how researchers can improve the photocatalytic efficiencies of different metal oxides in coming future. The strategies and outcomes outlined in this review are expected to stimulate the search for a whole new set of rare earth doped metal oxides for efficient photocatalytic applications.

SnO2 Composite Films for Enhanced Photocatalytic Activities

As a new type of promising semiconductor photocatalyst, SnO2 cannot be widely applied due to its low utilization efficiency to visible light and swift recombination of photogenerated electrons and holes. These drawbacks were effectively overcome by preparing the B/Ag/F tridoped SnO2-ZnO composite films using the simple sol–gel method. The degradation of the methyl green and formaldehyde solutions was used to value the photocatalytic activity of the samples. Photoluminescence (PL) spectra and the UV–Vis absorption spectroscopy results of the samples illustrated that the B/Ag/F tridoped SnO2-ZnO composite film not only improved the lifetime of the charge carriers, but also enhanced their visible light absorption. The X-ray diffraction (XRD) results showed that the crystalline SnO2 was in the structure of rutile. As exhibited in the BET surface area results, the specific surface area of pure SnO2 was 19.9 m2g−1, while that of the B/Ag/F tridoped SnO2-ZnO was 85.3 m2g−1. Compared to pure SnO2, SnO2-ZnO, or the mono- or di-doped SnO2-ZnO films, the B/Ag/F tridoped SnO2-ZnO composite film had the highest photocatalytic activity.