Graphite carbon nitride/ZnIn2S4 heterojunction photocatalyst with enhanced photocatalytic performance for degradation of tetracycline under visible light irradiation

It is a widespread concern to address the antibiotics in water with low-cost and eco-friendly photocatalysts that could efficiently harvest solar light. Herein, we designed an efficient photocatalyst by integrating the lamellar g-C 3 N 4 into Znln 2 S 4 microflowers through a one-step hydrothermal method . The as-synthesized g-C 3 N 4 /Znln 2 S 4 heterojunction photocatalysts exhibited evidently enhancement on the photocatalytic activities for the degradation of tetracycline (100 mL, 20 mg/L) compared with pristine g-C 3 N 4 and Znln 2 S 4 . Significantly, g-C 3 N 4 /Znln 2 S 4 composite with loading 50 wt.% g-C 3 N 4 showed the highest photocatalytic performance (almost 100% degradation within 120 min), which was around 40 and 22.8 times higher than that of g-C 3 N 4 and Znln 2 S 4 , respectively. This enhanced photocatalytic activity of g-C 3 N 4 /Znln 2 S 4 is mainly attributed to the formation of heterostructure that can efficiently promote the transfer of photoinduced electrons and holes between g-C 3 N 4 and ZnIn 2 S 4 , restricting the recombination of electron-hole pairs. In addition, a possible mechanism was also proposed.