N-Doped carbon dots decorated ceria hollow spheres for enhanced activity of RhB degradation by visible light

• DOI: 10.1007/s11696-018-0395-9
• Publication Date: 2018-01-25T02:51:02Z
• Authors: Fuqing Zhang; Yihui He; Weixin Li; Lei Zhao; Hui Chen; Xuan He; Jia Guo
• Keywords: 02 engineering and technology; 0210 nano-technology; 7. Clean energy

The fabrication of low-cost and environmentally friendly photocatalysts with superior photodegradation efficiency remains one of the most pressing challenges in present research. Herein, we elaborately designed and synthesized a promising N-doped carbon quantum dots/CeO2 hollow microsphere (NCQDs/h-CeO2) photocatalyst with superior photoresponse property and photoactivity in visible light. The removal efficiencies of rhodamine B (RhB) under visible light illumination for NCQDs/h-CeO2 exhibits a 30.3% enhancement compared with pure h-CeO2. The results of EIS and PL imply that the excellent performance may be attributed to the strong synergistic effect between NCQDs and h-CeO2, thus effectively promoting charge transfer and restraining the recombination of photogenerated holes and electrons. Accordingly, a synergistic photocatalysis mechanism was proposed to explain the photocatalytic reaction process. Besides, the NCQDs/h-CeO2 exhibits better cycle stability than common CQDs/h-CeO2 after a four-cycle photocatalytic test. Therefore, the NCQDs/h-CeO2 may represent a promising strategy for the current water pollution issues.