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Morphological influence of BiVO4 nanostructures on peroxymonosulfate activation for highly efficient catalytic degradation of rhodamine B

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Abstract

Bismuth vanadate (BiVO4) nanostructured films were prepared and successfully applied for peroxymonosulfate (PMS) activation for the degradation of rhodamine B (RhB) in aqueous solution. The BiVO4 thin films were obtained by thermal reaction between electrodeposited bismuth (Bi) films and vanadium precursor. The as-prepared BiVO4 porous, nanoflowers, and cluster nanostructures were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Raman spectroscopy, and BET analysis. The catalytic performance of BiVO4 nanostructures has been carefully evaluated in activating PMS for the degradation of RhB. The nanoflower-like BiVO4 nanostructures exhibit the best catalytic activity. Under optimized conditions, the complete catalytic degradation of RhB using BiVO4 nanoflowers/PMS system was achieved in 17 min at room temperature as revealed by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) analysis. Quenching experiments suggested that sulfate radicals are the main active species in the degradation process. Additionally, BiVO4 catalyst remained stable without any apparent activity loss after five cycling runs.

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Acknowledgements

K. Missaoui acknowledges the Ministry of High Education and Scientific Research (MHESR-Tunisia) and the Photovoltaic Laboratory of CRTEnfor having awarded her a research grant.

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KM is the student responsible for carrying out the work. RO had initiated work with KM. LJ assisted in the acquisition of X-ray diffraction diagrams. RB contributed to measurements of catalysis kinetics, interpretation of scanning electron microscopy images and Raman spectroscopy, and contributed to the revision of the manuscript. BB supervised all of the work and contributed to the writing and editing of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Brahim Bessaïs.

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Missaoui, K., Ouertani, R., Jbira, E. et al. Morphological influence of BiVO4 nanostructures on peroxymonosulfate activation for highly efficient catalytic degradation of rhodamine B. Environ Sci Pollut Res 28, 52236–52246 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-14320-8

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