Effect of Ceria Doped on Fibrous Silica Titania Catalyst for Enhanced Photodegradation of Ciprofloxacin in visible light

Fibrous silica titania, ceria metal loaded, photodegradation, ciprofloxacin, pharmaceutical

Abstract

Advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) is one of the most promising methods to degrade such organic pollutants from water. Titania (TiO2) is the most attractive semiconductor photocatalyst due to non-toxicity compound and low cost. Notwithstanding, its application is limited owing to the wide band gap, high recombination rate of the charge carriers, low surface area and low absorption of light. This study was focused on the synthesis of different ceria (Ce) loading on fibrous silica titania (FST) by using hydrothermal and impregnation method. The physical and chemical properties of FST-Ce was characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), ultraviolet visible spectrophotometer diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (UV-Vis/DRS), field emission scanning electron microscope (FESEM) and fourier transform infrared (FTIR); and the performance of photocatalytic activity was evaluated on the photodegradation of ciprofloxacin (CIP) under different type of catalysts, pH, catalyst dosage and CIP initial concentration. The result revealed that FST-3Ce showed the best performance due to low band gap, high crystallinity and strongest interaction between Si-O-Si, Si-OH, and Si-O-M bonds. A kinetic study using Langmuir-Hinshelwood model illustrated that the photodegradation followed the pseudo-first-order and adsorption was the rate-limiting step.