What is it about?
In this paper, we have described the oriented attachment mechanism in which CdWO4 nanorods obviously act as an epitaxial ‘substrate’ and guide a ZnWO4 aggregation process for the formation of CdWO4 nanorod based core–shell structures. The ZnWO4/CdWO4 core–shell structured nanorods were controllably synthesized using a facile refluxing method under mild conditions. The CdWO4 nanorods form the backbone of the material, and the ZnWO4 size could be tuned by changing the molar ratio of the Zn source and the Cd source. In addition, the photocatalytic activity and degradation mechanism of the ZnWO4/CdWO4 core–shell structured nanorods in the degradation of methylene blue (MB) under ultraviolet light irradiation were investigated in detail.
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Why is it important?
A CdWO4 nanorod-directed oriented attachment mechanism was clearly observed for the formation of the ZnWO4/CdWO4 core–shell structured nanorods. The size of the ZnWO4 could be tuned by changing the molar ratio of the Zn source and the Cd source. The photocatalytic activity of the ZnWO4/CdWO4 core–shell structured nanorods was much better than CdWO4. The enhancement in photocatalytic performance was demonstrated to be due to the match in lattice and energy levels between the ZnWO4 and CdWO4. This match facilitated the separation and transfer of photogenerated e−/h+ pairs at the heterojunction interfaces and might be important for other heterostructured materials.
Perspectives
Metal tungstates and molybdates, as a family of multicomponent metal oxide compounds, have been studied extensively due to their interesting structures and intriguing physical–chemical properties, as well as their wide range of applications in photoluminescence, magnetic materials, electrochemistry and photocatalysis. ZnWO4 and CdWO4 have the potential to produce a highly efficient photocatalytic material. Therefore, there was a need to investigate the photocatalytic activity of a ZnWO4/CdWO4 core–shell structured photocatalyst.
Dr Di Li
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Synthesis of ZnWO4/CdWO4 core–shell structured nanorods formed by an oriented attachment mechanism with enhanced photocatalytic performances, CrystEngComm, January 2016, Royal Society of Chemistry,
DOI: 10.1039/c5ce01858g.
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