Preparation and characterisation of Ce-doped SiO ₂ nano-materials as effective photo-catalyst under visible light

A series of silica-based nanocomposites have been synthesised by an impregnation and co-impregnation method, namely, 20 wt% Ti-SiO2, 20 wt% Ce-SiO2, 20Ti-Ce-SiO2 (10:10 wt/wt Ti:Ce), and 40Ti-Ce-SiO2 (20:20 wt/wt Ti:Ce). The prepared photocatalysts have been characterised by XRD, SBET, FT-IR, FE-SEM, XPS and optical techniques. The activity of the prepared photo-catalysts was evaluated using Fuchsine acid dye under UV and visible exposure. The degradation percentage and apparent first-order kinetics were calculated. The photo-degradation of the nano-composites was reached 62%, 84.8%, 79% and 73% for Ti-SiO2, Ce-SiO2, 20Ce-Ti-SiO2 and 40Ce-Ti-SiO2 after 180 min under visible irradiation. The scavenger’s assessment analysis was carried out to know the vital role of responsive species which responsible for photoactivity. The Ce-SiO2 exhibited an excellent photocatalytic activity of Fuchsine acid (FA) dye degradation under visible light. The photo-degradation rate (k) of the synthesised samples was 1.1 × 10−2 min−1 with R2 of 0.98 for Ce-SiO2 photo-catalyst. The results confirmed that the h+ and O2•− principally participate in the photodegradation of dye over Ce-SiO2 nano-composite; however, •OH contributes in negligible extent.