Cationic surfactant assisted morphology of Ag@Cu, and their catalytic reductive degradation of Rhodamine B.

We describes the UV–visible spectroscopic and transmission electron microscopic evidence to the reactivity of Cu 2 + , and Ag + towards hydrazine for the synthesis of cetyltrimethylammonium bromide, CTAB, capped spherical hetero-structure and hexahedral Ag@Cu. The conventional techniques like, UV–visible, TEM, SEM, EDS, and FT-IR were used to the characterization. The catalytic reductive degradation of Rhodamine B (RB) by using Ag@Cu bimetallic nanoparticles as a catalyst has been reported for the first time in this study. The decrease in [RB] was monitored by UV–visible spectroscopy. The [Ag@Cu] = 6.6 × 10 − 5 mol dm − 3 exhibited remarkable catalytic activity towards [RB] = 3.5 × 10 − 5 mol dm − 3 in presence of [NaBH 4 ] = 1.3 × 10 − 3 mol dm − 3 , with a degradation efficiency of ca. 100% in 4 min. The experimental data revealed that the removal of RB increased with increasing the [catalyst loading] and [NaBH 4 ]. Apparent-first order rate constants, turnover frequency, activation parameters (E a , ΔH # , and ΔS # ) have been calculated and discussed. A possible mechanism for the de-colorization of RB has been proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]