Ternary ZnO/Ag3VO4/Fe3O4 nanocomposites: Novel magnetically separable photocatalyst for efficiently degradation of dye pollutants under visible-light irradiation

• Ternary novel magnetically separable ZnO/Ag3VO4/Fe3O4 nanocomposites were prepared.
• ZnO/Ag3VO4/Fe3O4 (8:1) has superior activity in degradation of RhB in visible light.
• The activity of this nanocomposite is about 11.5-fold higher than that of ZnO/Fe3O4.
• The enhanced activity for degradation of two more dye pollutants was confirmed.

In this work, we successfully prepared a series of novel magnetically separable ZnO/Ag3VO4/Fe3O4 nanocomposites by a facile refluxing method using Fe3O4, zinc nitrate, silver nitrate, ammonium metavanadate, and sodium hydroxide as starting materials without using any post preparation treatments. The microstructure, purity, morphology, spectroscopic, and magnetic properties of the prepared samples were studied using XRD, EDX, SEM, TEM, UV–vis DRS, FT-IR, PL, and VSM techniques. The ZnO/Ag3VO4/Fe3O4 nanocomposite with 8:1 weight ratio of ZnO/Ag3VO4 to Fe3O4 has the superior activity in degradation of rhodamine B under visible-light irradiation. Photocatalytic activity of this nanocomposite is about 11.5-fold higher than that of the ZnO/Fe3O4 nanocomposite. The results showed that the preparation time and calcination temperature significantly affect on the photocatalytic activity. The trapping experiments revealed that superoxide ions and holes have major influence on the degradation reaction. Furthermore, the enhanced activity of the nanocomposite for degradation of two more dye pollutants was confirmed. Finally, the nanocomposite was magnetically separated from the treated solution after four successive cycles.

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