Tunable sulphur doping on CuFe ₂O ₄ nanostructures for the selective elimination of organic dyes from water

Abstract

In this work, sulphur doped copper ferrites (S-CuFe ₂O ₄) photocatalysts were successfully synthesized for the first time using the facile hydrothermal method. The as-synthesized photocatalysts were characterized through XRD, Raman, TGA, FT-IR, UV–Vis-DRS, SEM, EDX and PL techniques. The results revealed that doping with sulphur has been found to be a suitable alternative that causes strain in the lattices as anions replace the oxygen from the CuFe ₂O ₄ nanostructures. Due to sulphur dopants, photocatalysts are able to efficiently trap and transfer the photoinduced charges, which readily suppress charge recombination. A UV–Vis spectrophotometer was used to monitor the degradation of selective toxic organic dyes (RhB, CR, MO, and CV) in aqueous media. The dye degradation results provide evidence for the surprisingly superior performance of S-CuFe ₂O ₄ over pristine CuFe ₂O ₄. On the basis of its efficiencies, this work can be assigned as an excellent candidate for photocatalysis science.