Synthesis of TbMnO3 by Microwave Assisted Method and its Photocatalytic Activity

Using terbium oxide (Tb4O7), manganese acetate (MnC4H6O4·4H2O), citric acid (C6H8O7) and urea (CO(NH2)2) as the main materials, the TbMnO3 was prepared by a facile microwave assisted process. The TbMnO3 samples were characterized by thermogravimetric and differential thermal analysis (TG-DTA), powder X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and Fourier transform Infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy. XRD and SEM demonstrated the successful synthesis of single phase TbMnO3 and an average grain size of 100 nm in diameter. Under UV-light, the photocatalytic activity of TbMnO3 calcination at 800 °C was investigated by decomposition simulation wastewater containing 20 mg/L methyl orange (MO). The degradation rate of methyl orange can arrive to 95% when light irradiation was 180 min in presence of TbMnO3. The results show that TbMnO3 has highly photocatalytic activity for the degradation of methyl orange.