Design and fabrication of Ni(OH)2/BiVO4 heterostructured nano-photocatalyst for high-efficient removal of organic dyes

Configuring new nanostructured photocatalyst with high efficient photocatalystic capabilities is meaningfully for environmental pollution control. Herein, a p-n heterojunction nanostructured photocatalyst of Ni(OH) 2 /BiVO 4 was well designed and successfully fabricated via a facile solvothermal method, in which Ni(OH) 2 is a wide band-gap semiconductor. Being applied for photo-degradation of anion organic dye, it is found such Ni(OH) 2 /BiVO 4 heterostructures can not only increase the specific surface area and enhance the light response, but also effectively facilitate the photo-generated charge separation and transfer. As a result, 0.5-Ni(OH) 2 /BiVO 4 can possess a photocatalytic capability of 96% and a reaction rate constant 1.9572 h −1 within 90 min irradiation, being 6 and 18 times higher than that of pure BiVO 4 (16%, 0.1098 h −1 ). This study presents a new means to design a kind of high efficient wide band-gap semiconductor constructed BiVO 4 -based photocatalysts.