Photocatalytic performance of Gd ion modified titania porous hollow spheres under visible light

In this work, Gd-doped titania hollow spheres were prepared using hydrothermally prepared carbon spheres as template. The prepared samples were characterized by XRD, TEM, SEM, DRS and XPS. The photocatalytic activity of as-prepared hollow titania spheres was determined by degradation of Reactive Brilliant Red dye X-3B (C.I. reactive red 2) under visible light irradiation. The effect of Gd content on the physical structure and photocatalytic properties of doped titania hollow sphere samples was investigated. Results showed that there was an optimal Gd-doped content (4%) for the photocatalytic activity of X-3B degradation.