The synergistic effect of TiO2 and H5PW10V2O40 in photocatalysis as a function of the irradiation source

•TiO2 and H5PW10V2O40 catalyst has best results with “day light” fluorescent lamp.•UVA and TiO2/HPA present good initial activity, but after 1 h has deactivation.•No activity is observed when visible only LED radiation is used for TiO2/HPA.•Synergistic effect is observed using TiO2 and HPA using UV photon and visible light.

This work examined the use of pure TiO2, pure heteropolyacid (HPA) H5PW10V2O40 and TiO2 + H5PW10V2O40 catalysts in the photocatalytic decomposition of dimethyl sulfide (DMS) in the gas phase. DMS was irradiated with visible light from an LED (λ > 400 nm), black light UV-A (λ < 400 nm) and visible fluorescent lamp ‘daylight’ (variable emission in the UV-A and visible range). DMS decomposition reached almost 100% for the system containing the TiO2 + H5PW10V2O40 mixed catalyst with exposure to visible daylight. This system maintained stable catalytic activity up to 500 min. These results strongly suggest that a positive synergistic effect occurred between TiO2 and HPA when visible daylight was used.

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