Facile synthesis of silver/silver thiocyanate (Ag@AgSCN) plasmonic nanostructures with enhanced photocatalytic performance

• Xinfu Zhao,
• Dairong Chen,
• Abdul Qayum,
• Bo Chen and
• Xiuling Jiao

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2017, 8, 2781–2789, doi:10.3762/bjnano.8.277

• nanostructured plasmonic photocatalyst, silver/silver thiocyanate (Ag@AgSCN), has been prepared by a simple precipitation method followed by UV-light-induced reduction. The ratio of Ag to silver thiocyanate (AgSCN) can be controlled by simply adjusting the photo-induced reduction time. The formation mechanism of

• the product was investigated based on the time-dependent experiments. Further experiments indicated that the prepared Ag@AgSCN nanostructures with an atomic ratio of Ag/AgSCN = 0.0463 exhibited high photocatalytic activity and long-term stability for the degradation of oxytetracycline (84%) under

• . Keywords: Ag@AgSCN; degradation of oxytetracycline; plasmonic photocatalyst; stability; Introduction In the past decade, water decontamination technology has attracted great attention due to the increasing health risk that water contamination poses to humankind. The removal of pollutants has been