New Journal of Chemistry | 2021
A benevolent direction to environmental suitability: ionic liquid immobilized MoO3 nanoparticles used in the efficient visible light-driven photocatalytic degradation of antibiotics
Abstract
In this study we report, synthesis of a novel MoO3-bonded imidazolium-sulfonic acid chloride (MoO3-IL) and its application in photocatalytic degradation of two very highly polluting antibiotics viz. ciprofloxacin and metronidazole. The photocatalyst has been prepared via a facile precipitation technique and the morphological, structural, and photocatalytic properties were analyzed by FT-IR, powder XRD, SEM-EDX, TEM, XPS, UV-DRS, and PL studies. Under visible light irradiation, the immobilized functionalized ionic liquid material displayed considerably enriched photocatalytic activity for the degradation of ciprofloxacin and metronidazole. It exhibited a degradation efficiency of 92.07% for ciprofloxacin while it recorded complete degradation of metronidazole in 60 minutes with a 0.0391min-1 rate constant. The synergism of nano MoO3 and ionic liquid, lower bandgap, and late recombination of photoinduced charge carriers are the major factors of its high photocatalytic activity. Furthermore, the trapping experiments were conducted to confirm the photoactive radicals involved in the degradation process.