PH-induced structural evolution, photodegradation mechanism and application of bismuth molybdate photocatalyst

In this work, we have elucidated the pH-induced structural evolution of bismuth molybdate photocatalyst based on a hydrothermal synthesis route. With increasing the pH value of precursor solution, pure Bi2MoO6 was synthesized at pH 2–5, Bi2MoO6-Bi4MoO9 mixture was obtained at pH 7–9, pure Bi4MoO9 was obtained at pH 11, and pure α-Bi2O3 was derived at pH 13. The as-derived samples mainly present particle-like shapes but with different particle sizes (except the observation of Bi2MoO6 nanowires in sample S-pH9). The photocatalytic performances between the samples were compared via the degradation of methylene blue (MB) under irradiation of simulated sunlight. The Bi2MoO6 sample synthesized at pH 2 exhibited the highest photodegradation performance (η(30 min) = 89.8 %, kapp = 0.05007 min−1) among the samples. The underlying photocatalytic mechanism and degradation pathways of MB were systematically analyzed. Moreover, the photodegradation performance of the Bi2MoO6 photocatalyst was further evaluated at different acidic-alkaline environments as well as in degrading various color and colorless organic pollutants, which provides an important insight into its practical application.