Improved solar-driven photocatalytic performance of BiOI decorated TiO 2 benefiting from the separation properties of photo-induced charge carriers

In this work, BiOI decorated TiO2 photocatalysts were prepared in-situ by a facile hydrothermal method and characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), UV/Vis diffuse reflectance spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and surface photovoltage (SPV) spectroscopy. The reactive radicals during the photocatalytic reaction were detected by scavenger experiments. BiOI/TiO2 composites exhibit higher performance than the pure TiO2 towards photocatalytic decolorization of methyl orange (MO) aqueous solution, when the molar ratio of Bi/Ti is 2%, the sample has the highest photocatalytic activity. The enhanced photocatalytic performance of BiOI/TiO2 could be ascribed to the separation properties of photo-induced charge carriers and strong interaction between BiOI and TiO2. Based on the observations, a Z-scheme charge separation mechanism was proposed.