Zhifeng Jiao

One-step synthesis of Ag/AgCl/GO composite: A photocatalyst of extraordinary photoactivity and stability

Recently, the photocatalytic applications of silver chloride have been paid closed attention for the excellent ability to photodegrade organic pollutants. Comparing with other catalysts, the silver chloride presents outstanding photocatalytic activity. However, it also suffers from the poor photocatalytic stability. This very paper is focusing on the one-step wet chemical process of preparing Ag/AgCl/GO photocatalyst with high photocatalytic activity and stability. The detailed characterizations were particularly carried out in order to investigate the photo-catalytic activity and stability. Meanwhile the morphology, chemical composition as well as crystalline structure were investigated. It is found that the as-prepared Ag/AgCl/GO composite exhibited an ultrahigh photocatalytic activity and stability in the process of photodegrading RhB. The unique catalytic activity has been discussed based on the SPR effect in Ag nanoparticles on AgCl surface and the separation of photo-generated electron-hole pairs, the primary benefit of the stability owes a great deal to GO which can capture the photo-generated electrons in case they reduce Ag+ ion or recombine the excited holes.

Investigation of the synthesis, SERS performance and application in glucose sensing of hierarchical 3D silver nanostructures

In this paper, the synthesis, SERS performance and application in glucose sensing of hierarchical 3D Ag nanostructures (NSs) are reported. Large-scale Ag jujube-like architectures were produced via the galvanic reaction process in a mixed solution of trisodium citrate (TSC) and AgNO3 on Cu nanoparticles disproportioned from Cu2O membranes. X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, atomic force microscopy, high resolution transmission electron microscopy, and Raman spectroscopy have been utilized to characterize the as-prepared samples. It was found that the defects existed in the Ag crystals may play a significant role in the morphological formation of the building units of the self-assemblies. In addition, the optimum ratio of the Ag+ concentration to the TSC addition amount for preparing the desired Ag nanojujubes (NJs) was determined by studying the effects of the Ag+ concentration and the TSC addition on the morphology of the final products. The formation mechanism of the hierarchical 3D AgNJs was then discussed. Furthermore, in terms of sensitivity, reproducibility and stability, jujube-like hierarchical architectures constituted of Ag nanosheets with highly-roughened surfaces were proved to be promising for surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) applications, which were further demonstrated in comparison with other AgNSs. It is also worth pointing out that jujube-like hierarchical Ag architectures performed well in glucose detection, which would have great potential in the biological and medical fields.

Preparation of Au NPs/ZnO NTs Hybrid Array and Its Photo Catalytic Performance for MO

X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy were employed to investigate the microstructure and morphology of Au NPs/ZnO NTs, and their photo-catalytic capability was assessed to a nicety. The results demonstrated that the diameter and the wall thickness of ZnO nanotube were about 200 and 50 nm, respectively. The diameter of Au nanoparticle was about 30 nm. The characterization on the photo-catalytic capability of the Au-ZnO nanotube hybrid indicated that the degradation of methyl orange was 80% within 4 h. Controlled experiments have shown that Au-ZnO nanotube hybrid presents superior photo-catalytic capability to both bare ZnO nanorod and Au-ZnO nanorod hybrid indicated that the degradation procedure of methyl orange.