The hybridization of Ag2CO3 rods with g-C3N4 sheets with improved photocatalytic activity

A series of graphitic carbon nitride/silver carbonate (g-c3n4/ag2co3) rod-like composites with different weight contents of g-c3n4 have been prepared by a facile precipitation method. the g-c3n4/ag2co3 rod-like composites exhibited higher photocatalytic activity than pure ag2co3 toward degradation of rhodamine b (rhb) and methylene blue (mb) under visible-light irradiation. the photocatalytic reaction follows a pseudo-first-order reaction and the rate constants for the degradation of rhb and mb by 3.5% g-c3n4/ag2co3 are about 2 times and 1.7 times that of pure ag2co3,respectively. a possible photocatalytic mechanism was proposed based on the photoluminescence (pl) spectra and a series of radical trapping experimental analyses. the remarkably improved photocatalytic performance should be ascribed to the heterostructure between ag2co3 and g-c3n4,which greatly promoted the photoinduced charge transfer and inhibited the recombination of electrons and holes. © 2015 king saud university.