Glycol-assisted construction of three-dimensionally ordered macroporous ZnO-Cu2O-TiO2 with enhanced photocatalytic properties

The Zn and Cu bi-components co-modified ZnO-Cu2O-TiO2 composites with 3DOM structure were constructed via a facile glycol-assisted sol-gel method. The morphology, composition and structure of the prepared samples with five different Cu/Zn mass ratios were characterized by XRD, SEM, XPS, UV-VIS DRS and N-2 adsorption-desorption. The results indicate that the oxygen vacancies contents of the as-prepared catalysts are heavily dependent on the Cu/Zn mass ratios. Among the five catalysts, the Zn-0.06-Cu-0.14 sample shows the highest oxygen vacancies content. These findings reveal that the introduction of a certain proportional ZnO and Cu2O can promote the capturing efficiency of visible light and the charge carrier separation, ultimately resulting in an enhanced photodecoloration performance of MB. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.