Novel catalyst of zinc tetraamino-phthalocyanine supported by multi-walled carbon nanotubes with enhanced visible-light photocatalytic activity

Zinc tetraamino-phthalocyanine (ZnTAPc) supported by multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) hybrid materials were successfully fabricated by the method of chemical grafting and their photocatalysis behavior was reported. The as-prepared products were thoroughly characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman spectroscopy, transmission electron microscopy (TEM), UV-vis spectra, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and FT-IR spectra. The results showed that the ZnTAPc nanostructures were not only grown on the multi-walled carbon nanotubes but also uniformly distributed without aggregation. The photocatalytic studies revealed that the ZnTAPc-MWCNTs hybrid materials exhibited high absorption capacity and simultaneously excellent visible-light-driven photocatalytic performance for rhodamine B (RB) under visible-light irradiation. A possible mechanism for the photodegradation of rhodamine B (RB) was suggested. The hybrid materials provide great potential as active photocatalysts for degrading organic pollutions.