Facile Synthesis of Mesoporous Hierarchical Tio2 Micro-Flowers Serve as Scaffolding of 0d Ag3po4 Nanoparticles for Ultra-Fast Degradation of Organic Pollutants

Using hierarchical structure TiO 2 as a scaffolding to constructing heterojunctions has been proven to be an efficient method to enhance photocatalytic activity. In this work, 0D/3D hierarchical Ag 3 PO 4 /TiO 2 photocatalysts were prepared via an improved hydrothermal-induced solvent-confined assembly and in-situ fabrication method. The SEM results suggesting that with the increasing of Ag 3 PO 4 , more and more agglomerated Ag 3 PO 4 particles were detected. As a results, the APT-1 exhibited highest photocatalytic activity and decomposed 96.5% MB in 9 min or 94.6% of RhB in 12 min. The heterojunction of APT-1 also exhibit excellent photocatalytic activity for the mixed dye under four real water bodies and the degradation can be completed with ~20 min. The outstanding photocatalytic activity of obtained Ag 3 PO 4 /TiO 2 composites can be attributed to suitable size of Ag 3 PO 4 , unique hierarchical porous nature, high efficiency of photoinduced carrier separation and transfer. The proposed photocatalytic mechanisms and charge transfer pathways in heterojunction photocatalysts were investigated by valence band X-ray photoelectron spectra (VB-XPS), ultraviolet photoelectron spectra (UPS), Mott-Schottky analysis, and scavenging experiments. The results illustrate the formation of a type-II heterojunction between Ag 3 PO 4 and TiO 2 . This work will provide new insight into designing and constructing heterojunction photocatalytic for decomposing organic pollutions