Performance Enhanced Photodegradation of Organic Dyes by Ag loaded ZnO-Graphene Ternary Nanocomposite.

This work reports the structural and optical properties of pure ZnO, Ag loaded ZnO and Ag loaded ZnOgraphene ternary nanocomposite, and their photo degradation performance was analyzed by using methyl orange and methylene blue as model dyes. Structural confirmation was done by XRD and raman spectroscopy. Band gap of the photocatalysts was analyzed by the UV-visible absorption spectra and were calculated to be 3.19, 3.17 and 3.12 eV for pure ZnO, Ag: ZnO and Ag: ZnO-G respectively. Charge separation of the generated electron-hole pairs was studied by photoluminescence spectroscopy. Ag: ZnO-G ternary nanocomposite showed the best photocatalytic activity in comparison with two other samples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]