Boosting visible light response and charge separation by plasmonic Ag and TiO modification of AgVO for degradation of pollutants.

The formation of heterojunction structures of semiconductors is one of the most important techniques to increase the photocatalytic efficiency of a photocatalyst. In this paper, Ag/AgVO/TiO as a visible light response photocatalyst was prepared easily by a three step process including hydrothermal, precipitation and photoreduction. The Ag/AgVO/TiO nanocomposites demonstrated clearly increased visible light absorption and photocatalytic efficiency in degradation of Rhodamine B. The degradation yield of Rhodamine B was detected 97.3% in 45 min under visible light. Compared with AgVO, TiO and AgVO/TiO, Ag/AgVO/TiO exhibited the highest efficiency owing to synergetic effect between AgVO and TiO and surface plasmon resonance effect of Ag nanoparticles. So, the Ag/AgVO/TiO can be effectively used as an active photocatalyst under visible light and it depicts an ideal potential in elimination organic pollutants.