Synthesis of novel BiOBr/Bio-veins composite for photocatalytic degradation of pollutants under visible-light

A novel BiOBr/Bio-vein photocatalyst was synthesized with a wet drop addition method, where the substrate biological veins (Bio-veins) were obtained with a green and environmentally-friendly multiple route. BiOBr/Bio-veins composite show larger visible light adsorption compared with pure BiOBr, and the size of BiOBr nanosheet from BiOBr/Bio-veins composite is smaller than that of pure BiOBr. BiOBr/Bio-veins composite shows highly photocatalytic degradation of Rhodamine B (RhB) under visible light irradiation. Reactive species trapping experiments and electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) tests were used to explore photodegradation mechanism of BiOBr/Bio-veins, which demonstrated that superoxide radicals (center dot O-2(-)) and holes (h(+)) were the main active groups for photocatalytic degradation. Moreover, BiOBr/Bio-veins composite can be easily recovered without centrifugation and filtration. This study provides novel natural biological materials to immobilize photocatalyst particles with highly photocatalytic degradation of pollutants.