Preparation of NiS/ZnIn₂S₄ as a superior photocatalyst for hydrogen evolution under visible light irradiation

• Liang Wei,
• Yongjuan Chen,
• Jialin Zhao and
• Zhaohui Li

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2013, 4, 949–955, doi:10.3762/bjnano.4.107

• nanocomposite and is compared with that of pure ZnIn2S4 and NiS. Although NiS is a good electrocatalyst for hydrogen evolution [36], no hydrogen was evolved when NiS alone was used as the photocatalyst. Pure ZnIn2S4 only had a very low activity with the hydrogen evolution at a rate of 14.1 μmol/h. However, the

• with a heavy loading of NiS is likely due to the shading effect of NiS, which can block the absorption of the incident light by ZnIn2S4. Therefore, an appropriate loading amount of NiS is crucial to achieve the optimized photocatalytic activity of the ZnIn2S4 photocatalyst. NiS/ZnIn2S4 nanocomposites

• show high stability during the photocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction. A prolonged photocatalytic reaction for 15 h over 0.5 wt % NiS/ZnIn2S4 revealed that no obvious loss of the activity during the whole reaction period (Figure 7). Besides this, the unchanged XRD pattern of the photocatalyst after

Structural, optical and photocatalytic properties of flower-like ZnO nanostructures prepared by a facile wet chemical method

• Sini Kuriakose,
• Neha Bhardwaj,
• Jaspal Singh,
• Biswarup Satpati and
• Satyabrata Mohapatra

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2013, 4, 763–770, doi:10.3762/bjnano.4.87

• these toxic chemicals. Photocatalytic degradation, in which the organic pollutants are degraded through photocatalytic oxidation and reduction reactions in the presence of a photocatalyst, is one of the most promising and clean processes used for water purification. Nanostructured semiconductor

• Figures 4a–c show the UV–vis absorption spectra of an aqueous solution of 22.4 μM MB with either photocatalyst S1, S2 or S3 after irradiation with sunlight for different durations of time. The characteristic absorption peak of MB at 664 nm is monitored as a function of the sunlight exposure time. It can

• S2 we could achieve about 95% degradation of MB for the same exposure time. Almost complete (99.6%) photodegradation of MB could be achieved with S2 as photocatalyst after 60 min of exposure to sunlight, while samples S1 and S3 could degrade only 97.8% and 68.2% respectively after the same exposure

Modulation of defect-mediated energy transfer from ZnO nanoparticles for the photocatalytic degradation of bilirubin

• Tanujjal Bora,
• Karthik K. Lakshman,
• Soumik Sarkar,
• Abhinandan Makhal,
• Samim Sardar,
• Samir K. Pal and
• Joydeep Dutta

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2013, 4, 714–725, doi:10.3762/bjnano.4.81

• (Figure 1b). Following the optical characterization of the ZnO nanoparticle samples, we have explored the effect of the concentration of the surface defects in the ZnO nanoparticles on the photocatalytic degradation of BR, when using the nanoparticles as a photocatalyst medium. The photocatalytic

• temperature and stored in a refrigerator for further use. Photocatalyst preparation For the annealing of the ZnO nanoparticles, six glass substrates (1.5 cm × 1.5 cm) were placed on a hot plate (60 °C) and 100 μL of the as-prepared ZnO nanoparticle colloidal solution was dropped on each glass substrate. The

Nanostructure-directed chemical sensing: The IHSAB principle and the dynamics of acid/base-interface interaction

• James L. Gole and
• William Laminack

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2013, 4, 20–31, doi:10.3762/bjnano.4.3

• transformation from acidic to basic sites. These studies also define a broadened interaction matrix as it extends from physisorption (sensing) applications to chemisorption and microreactor design. Recently, we have produced visible-light-absorbing TiO2−xNx photocatalyst nanoparticles in seconds at room

Paper modified with ZnO nanorods – antimicrobial studies

• Mayuree Jaisai,
• Sunandan Baruah and
• Joydeep Dutta

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2012, 3, 684–691, doi:10.3762/bjnano.3.78

• strong oxidizing agent [17]. The reactions initiated by photogenerated electrons, leading to the formation of hydroxyl radicals and hydrogen peroxide, are summarized as follows [19]: where MO stands for metal-oxide photocatalyst, such as TiO2, ZnO, etc., and the reaction products and intermediates are

Mesoporous MgTa₂O₆ thin films with enhanced photocatalytic activity: On the interplay between crystallinity and mesostructure

• Jin-Ming Wu,
• Igor Djerdj,
• Till von Graberg and
• Bernd M. Smarsly

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2012, 3, 123–133, doi:10.3762/bjnano.3.13

• photocatalyst access to the target molecules and also possess a high specific surface area. Unfortunately, because of the high crystallization temperature and low decomposition temperature of most commercially available templates, the fabrication of ordered mesoporous MgTa2O6 thin films with crystallized walls

• the ability to assist photoinduced water-splitting, their activities are not promising [10][11]. The successful synthesis of the present novel nanoarchitectured MgTa2O6 film significantly promoted the potential property of MgTa2O6 as a photocatalyst, which we believe could find practical applications

Self-assembled monolayers and titanium dioxide: From surface patterning to potential applications

• Yaron Paz

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2011, 2, 845–861, doi:10.3762/bjnano.2.94

• ; Introduction Photocatalytic degradation of pollutants is attracting increasing attention. In this context, anatase-phase titanium dioxide is regarded as the photocatalyst of choice, due to its low cost, nontoxicity, and relatively high efficiency, which make it suitable not only for air and water

• decontamination [1][2] but also for self-cleaning applications [3]. The general scheme for the photocatalytic destruction of organics involves the excitation of this semiconductor by irradiation with suprabandgap photons and migration of the electron–hole pairs to the surface of the photocatalyst, where the holes

• applied bias acted to push photogenerated holes to the external surface of the TiO2 layer while pulling the photogenerated electrons to the platinum electrons, thus limiting the recombination rate. Indeed, the degradation rate constant was found to increase as the positive bias on the photocatalyst was

Approaches to nanostructure control and functionalizations of polymer@silica hybrid nanograss generated by biomimetic silica mineralization on a self-assembled polyamine layer

• Jian-Jun Yuan and
• Ren-Hua Jin

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2011, 2, 760–773, doi:10.3762/bjnano.2.84

• –superhydrophilic) by surface hydrophobic treatment and UV irradiation. The anatase titania component in the nanograss film acts as a highly efficient photocatalyst for the decomposition of the low-surface-energy organic components attached to the nanosurface. The ease with which the nanostructure can be controlled

Enhanced visible light photocatalysis through fast crystallization of zinc oxide nanorods

• Sunandan Baruah,
• Mohammad Abbas Mahmood,
• Myo Tay Zar Myint,
• Tanujjal Bora and
• Joydeep Dutta

Beilstein J. Nanotechnol. 2010, 1, 14–20, doi:10.3762/bjnano.1.3

• sites arising from oxygen nonstoichiometry, has emerged to be an efficient photocatalyst material compared to other metal oxides [8][9][10]. ZnO exhibits comparatively higher reaction and mineralization rates [11] and can generate hydroxyl ions more efficiently than titania (TiO2) [12]. Surface area and