Environmentally benign synthesis of Co3O4-SnO2 heteronanorods with efficient photocatalytic performance activated by visible light.

One-dimensional (1D) heterostructured photocatalysts with controllable texture properties and compositions have attracted increasing interest owing to their unique optical, structural, and electronic advantages. Herein, 1D Co3O4-SnO2 heteronanorods were rationally designed and synthesized through a facile solution-based approach. Benefiting from both of their heterostructural and compositional characteristics, the resulting Co3O4-SnO2 heteronanorods exhibit high photocatalytic performance for the degradation of Rhodamine B (RhB) under visible-light irridation. In particular, the photocatalyst with a Co3O4/SnO2 mass ratio of 1:1 provides the best photocatalytic performance, which can degrade 90% RhB within 120 min. Besides, several reaction parameters affecting RhB degradation, such as churning time, calcination temperature and pH value, are investigated in detail. The enhanced photocatalytic activity can be attributed to the broadening of absorption spectrum to visible-light regions and the efficient charge separation of photogenerated electron-hole pairs due to the formed p-n heterojunctions. The strategy reported here can be able to expand to fabricate other heterostructured photocatalysts for practical applications in the fields of photocatalysis, water splitting, and solar cells.