Copper- and Manganese-based Bimetallic Layered Double Hydroxides for Catalytic Reduction of Methylene Blue

In this study, copper (Cu)- and manganese (Mn)-based layered double hydroxide (LDH) nanosheets were produced by modest and low-cost hydrothermal technique to display an improved photocatalytic performance toward the degradation of aqueous methylene blue (MB). The morphological and structural properties of the as-prepared photocatalysts were characterized through various techniques comprising XRD, FT-IR, SEM, EDS, and their MB degradation activity was evaluated under visible light irradiation. SEM results explore that the synthesized LDH materials have a sheet-like morphology and are stacked layer by layer. Various analysis parameters, such as the effect of the contact time, concentration and pH of MB solutions were performed to optimize the performance of fabricated LDH materials. The results revealed that the as-synthesized CuAl-LDH and MnAl-LDH exhibited a 74.95 and 70.93% removal of MB under solar light within 180 min. Moreover, synthesized photocatalysts showed an excellent performance of up to four regeneration cycles. We believe that this study provides novel mechanistic insights into the design and preparation of highly competent photocatalysts using low-cost materials, with applications in environmental remediation.