Novel BiVO4/InVO4 heterojunctions: Facile synthesis and efficient visible-light photocatalytic performance for the degradation of rhodamine B

In this work, novel visible-light-driven BiVO4/InVO4 composite photocatalysts were fabricated by a facile hydrothermal method. The XRD results indicated that the prepared photocatalyst is a two-phase composite of BiVO4 and InVO4. SEM results illustrated that with the increase of BiVO4 content the morphology of BiVO4/InVO4 composites changed from hierarchical microsphere to leaf-like nanostructure. The photocatalytic activities of the as-synthesized samples were evaluated towards the degradation of rhodamine B (Rh B) aqueous solution. The results showed that the as-fabricated BiVO4/InVO4 photocatalysts displayed much higher photocatalytic activities in comparison with pure InVO4. The BiVO4/InVO4 composite with a BiVO4 content of 80 wt% exhibited the highest photocatalytic performance. The enhanced photocatalytic activity of the BiVO4/InVO4 composite photocatalyst was attributed predominantly to the efficient separation of photoinduced electrons and holes because of the heterojunction formed between BiVO4 and InVO4. The possible photocatalytic mechanism of BiVO4/InVO4 composite was also discussed in detail. Superoxide radicals were the major active species.