This paper reports the synthesis and characterization of NiO-ZnO nanodisks synthesized through a facile hydrothermal method. The morphological characterizations confirmed the formation of well-defined nanodisks in high density with an average thickness of 60 ± 5 nm. The x-ray diffraction analysis confirmed the well incorporation of the NiO into the matrix of ZnO crystal and the average crystallite size for the NiO-ZnO nanodisks was found to be 39.71 nm. The compositional analysis revealed the formation of pure NiO-ZnO nanostructures. The synthesized NiO-ZnO nanodisks were used as electrode materials to fabricate Sulfur dioxide (SO2) gas sensors and the gas sensor response and recovery times were systematically analyzed with respect to the operating temperatures and the SO2 gas concentration. The observed sensor gas response, response time and recovery time of the fabricated NiO-ZnO nanodisks based gas sensor were 16.25, 52 s and 41 s, respectively, towards 20 ppm SO2 gas at an optimized temperature of 240 °C. Thus, it is believed that the NiO-ZnO nanodisks could be a promising candidate for the fabrication of efficient gas sensors towards toxic and hazardous gases.

High sensitive and low-concentration sulfur dioxide (SO2) gas sensor application of heterostructure NiO-ZnO nanodisks

Semiconductor assisted photocatalysis has attracted a pronounced attention owing to its vital role in environmental remediation. Effective light absorption, particularly in the visible region, and charge separation are the two most important factors affecting a photocatalytic system which is generally hard to be achieved by the bare photocatalysts. The blending of various semiconductor materials for the fabrication of heterojunction enhances the photocatalytic activity and stability by decreasing the rate of combination of electron-hole pairs. This review succinctly outlines the recent progress in the synthesis methods and the photocatalytic performances of semiconductor-semiconductor heterojunctions and semiconductor-carbon heterojunctions for degradation of pollutants like dyes, antibiotics, insecticides, herbicides, pesticides, and water splitting. The review ends with a summary and some future perspectives on this fast-emerging area of research.

Photodegradation of organic pollutants using heterojunctions: A review

Controlled synthesis of CuO decorated defect enriched ZnO nanoflakes for improved sunlight-induced photocatalytic degradation of organic pollutants

Herein, MoS₂-ZnO heterostructure nanorods were hydrothermally synthesized and characterized in detail using several compositional, optical, and morphological techniques. The comprehensive characterizations show that the synthesized MoS₂/ZnO heterostructure nanorods were composed of wurtzite hexagonal phase of ZnO and rhombohedral phase of MoS₂. The synthesized MoS₂/ZnO heterostructure nanorods were used as a potent photocatalyst for the decomposition of methylene blue (MB) dye under natural sunlight. The prepared MoS₂/ZnO heterostructure nanorods exhibited ~97% removal of MB in the reaction time of 20 min with the catalyst amount of 0.15 g/L. The kinetic study revealed that the photocatalytic removal of MB was found to be in accordance with pseudo first-order reaction kinetics with an obtained rate constant of 0.16262 min-1. The tremendous photocatalytic performance of MoS₂-ZnO heterostructure nanorods could be accredited to an effective charge transportation and inhibition in the recombination of photo-excited charge carriers at an interfacial heterojunction. The contribution of active species towards the decomposition of MB using MoS₂-ZnO heterostructure nanorods was confirmed from scavenger study and terephthalic acid fluorescence technique.

https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1944/11/11/2254/pdf

Rapid Solar-Light Driven Superior Photocatalytic Degradation of Methylene Blue Using MoS₂-ZnO Heterostructure Nanorods Photocatalyst.

A potential natural solar light active photocatalyst using magnetic ZnFe2O4 @ TiO2/Cu nanocomposite as a high performance and recyclable platform for degradation of naproxen from aqueous solution

BiF3 octahedrons: A potential natural solar light active photocatalyst for the degradation of Rhodamine B dye in aqueous phase

Herein, we report the enhanced solar light-mediated photocatalytic degradation of brilliant green dye using BiPO4 nanospindles and MoS2/BiPO4 nanorods synthesized by facile hydrothermal process. The synthesized nanomaterials were examined by various techniques such as X-ray diffraction, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, transmission electron microscopy (TEM) attached with energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, Brunauer–Emmett–Teller, and pore size distribution analysis. The detailed characterizations revealed that after the introduction of MoS2, the crystalline phase transformation from hexagonal to monoclinic was observed for BiPO4. The TEM images clearly confirmed that BiPO4 possessed nanospindles and MoS2/BiPO4 exhibited nanorod-shaped morphologies. The photocatalytic activity of synthesized MoS2/BiPO4 nanorod heterojunction was explored for the degradation of brilliant green (BG) dye under solar light irradiation. Interestingly, approximate 80% degradation of BG was observed under solar light in 70 min using MoS2/BiPO4 nanorods as photocatalyst. As an efficient photocatalyst, the synthesized MoS2/BiPO4 nanorod heterojunction exhibited enhanced photocatalytic efficiency as compared to pure BiPO4 nanospindles, commercially available TiO2PC-50 and TiO2 PC-500 under solar light. The high photocatalytic activity of MoS2/BiPO4 nanorod heterojunction could be related to the amended visible light-harvesting tendency, effective charge separation, and facile transportation of photogenerated e−/h+ pairs at the heterojunction interface.

Ritika

Papers

Rapid Solar-Light Driven Superior Photocatalytic Degradation of Methylene Blue Using MoS₂-ZnO Heterostructure Nanorods Photocatalyst.

BiF3 octahedrons: A potential natural solar light active photocatalyst for the degradation of Rhodamine B dye in aqueous phase

Enhanced solar light-mediated photocatalytic degradation of brilliant green dye in aqueous phase using BiPO 4 nanospindles and MoS 2 /BiPO 4 nanorods

Visible-Light Photocatalytic Degradation of Organic Pollutants Using Molybdenum Disulfide (MoS2) Microtubes

Employment of the CRISPR/Cas9 system to improve cellulase production in Trichoderma reesei.