In situ coupling of TiO2(B) and ZIF-8 with enhanced photocatalytic activity via effective defect

In recent years, photocatalytic degradation on inorganic semiconductors has been attracting widespread attention. However, for a single semiconductor, the speed of the recombination of electrons and holes is fast, which leads to a decrease in the absorption of sunlight, thereby affecting its photocatalytic efficiency. Therefore, the coupling of semiconductor and metal–organic framework is of great significance due to its porosity and large specific surface area. Herein, a composite photocatalyst was obtained by coupling ZIF-8 and TiO2(B) via a simple method. XRD, FT-IR spectroscopy, SEM, TEM, UV-visible diffuse reflectance spectroscopy, XPS, EPR and EDS were used to study the as-prepared samples. Photocatalytic degradation experiments confirmed that the composites have significantly improved photodegradation performance due to the increased light utilization and fast charge carrier transfer. Moreover, the possible mechanism of photodegradation was also proposed. This study provides an initial view on the coupling of semiconductor and metal–organic framework to enhance the photocatalytic performance.