A spherical TiO2-Bi2WO6 composite photocatalyst for visible-light photocatalytic degradation of ethylene

In this paper, Bi2WO6 porous microspheres were prepared via a hydrothermal method and nano-TiO2 uniformly dotted on the surface of the Bi2WO6 microspheres using deposition technology to self-assemble a porous layer spherical TiO2-Bi2WO6 (TB) composite photocatalyst. The photocatalytic activity of the composite photocatalyst was evaluated using ethylene as the target degradation product. The results show that the photocatalytic degradation of ethylene by the TB composite photocatalyst was significantly improved, especially 10 % TB. Samples containing 10 % titanium dioxide had the highest photocatalytic activity for ethylene degradation. In addition, the degradation rate of ethylene was as high as 20.90 %, which was 1.53 times higher than that of Bi2WO6 microspheres. The spherical structure of the porous layer gives the composite photocatalyst a high specific surface area, which can effectively promote the rapid migration of photogenerated carriers between TiO2 and Bi2WO6, and prevent the recombination of photogenerated electrons and photogenerated holes, thereby effectively improving the photocatalytic performance.