Combination of alkali treatment and Ag 3 PO 4 loading effectively improves the photocatalytic activity of TiO 2 nanoflowers

In this paper, three-dimensional TiO 2 nanoflowers (NFs) were prepared by a facile hydrothermal method, and Ag 3 PO 4 was grown in situ following alkali treatment to design and synthesize a Ag 3 PO 4 /OH/TiO 2 catalyst with excellent photocatalytic activity under visible light. The test results show that the photocatalytic degradation performance of TiO 2 NFs after alkali treatment and Ag 3 PO 4 loading is significantly improved. This is because the alkali treatment and the introduction of Ag 3 PO 4 can provide a large amount of –OH, which can be converted to ˙OH under UV irradiation, followed by an increase in the number of active radicals to enhance the photocatalytic degradation performance. Meanwhile, the introduction of Ag 3 PO 4 can effectively improve the light absorption ability of the photocatalyst. Moreover, the in situ growth of Ag 3 PO 4 on TiO 2 NFs can construct a high-quality Ag 3 PO 4 /TiO 2 heterojunction to promote the charge separation and transport. Therefore, the degradation rate of Ag 3 PO 4 /OH/TiO 2 can reach 90% after 30 min for degrading 3 mg L −1 RhB under visible light. The Ag 3 PO 4 /OH/TiO 2 photocatalyst designed in the present work provides a new tool for the degradation of organic dyes.