Construction of novel magnetic BiFeO3/MoS2 composite for enhanced visible-light photocatalytic performance towards purification of dye pollutants

This research focuses on a novel visible light-responsive photocatalysis system employing MoS2 and magnetically responsive BiFeO3 for removing dye. Novel BiFeO3/MoS2 magnetic nanocomposite was successfully synthesised by a simple method and characterised by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), Uv–Vis diffuse reflection spectra (DRS) and vibrating sample magnetometry (VSM). Comparing with pure BiFeO3 and MoS2, the prepared nanocomposite illustrated notably better photocatalytic activity. The outcome of the photocatalytic experiments depicted that nanocomposite reaches to about 89% removal of Rhodamine B in 200 min under visible light irradiation. The superior photocatalytic activity could be attributed to the high separation efficacy of the photogenerated electron-hole pairs. Moreover, the BiFeO3/MoS2 nanocomposite can be separated and collected easily by an external magnetic field and maintain high activity after three times photoreaction cycles. Trapping experiments have contributed to propose the possible mechanism for the improved photocatalytic activity of the nanocomposite.