Hydrothermal preparation of novel rGO-KTaO3 nanocubes with enhanced visible light photocatalytic activity

In this study, nanocubes KTaO3–reduced graphene oxide (rGO–KTaO3) photocatalysts were synthesized by a facile hydrothermal method. Different technical methods were carried out to characterize the as-prepared compounds. UV–Vis spectra show that the absorption sideband of the complexes red-shift to visible light region, which enhances the light utilization. Meanwhile, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) reveals that the graphene oxide (GO) in the composite has been partially reduced, leading to more effective electron transport and thus improving the photocatalytic efficiency. Furthermore, photocatalytic degradation efficiency of Methylene blue (MB) and Rhodamine B (RhB) in the presence of rGO–KTaO3 reaches 96% and 98%, which is 10 times of that of KTaO3. The synthesized rGO-KTaO3 has good photocatalytic properties. Moreover, the stability of this photocatalyst is particularly excellent. The detailed mechanism of photocatalysis has been carefully discussed in the article.