Research Projects

More than 15% of the world's total dye output is found in textile effluents. The dye wastewater is very harmful for the entire biosphere. Hence, development of efficient methodologies for treating dye wastewater are urgently needed to safeguard the water resource. This proposal aims to develop a novel photocatalyst and evaluate the photocatalytic treatability of simulated and real textile wastewater to reuse it again for different purposes. The semiconductor-based heterogeneous photocatalysis has become one of the most promising ‘green and safe’ purification technology. However, this approach is unable to provide efficient charge separation and redox ability of photogenerated electrons and/or holes at the same time. Thus, novelty of our study will lie on fabrication next generation high performance Bi₂Fe₄O₉/2D g-C₃N₄ nanocomposite films and their application in the treatment of textile dye wastewater by photodegradation method in a properly designed photoreactor. The intrinsic internal electric field of magnetoelectric multiferroic Bi₂Fe₄O₉ would promote the migration of electrons across the interface between Bi₂Fe₄O₉ and 2D g-C₃N₄ by formation of Z-scheme heterojunction which would result in high photocatalytic efficiency. In this study, we will synthesize phase pure multiferroic Bi₂Fe₄O₉ nanoparticles as well as thin films and the defective g-C₃N₄ to improve the reaction rate via trap the photogenerated electron and hole in the defect state. Then, the photocatalyst Bi₂Fe₄O₉/2D g-C₃N₄ nanocomposite thin films will be fabricated through in-situ approach using spin coating method for lab scale synthesis to treat simulated textile wastewater and ex-situ approach using doctor-blade coating for large area synthesis to treat real textile wastewater. The nanocomposite films will be characterized using several microscopic methods and the photocatalytic performance and stability of the photocatalysts will be studied in treatment of real and simulated textile wastewater by photodegradation method in a properly designed reactor and the properties of treated textile industrial wastewater will be investigated to reuse it again for different purposes. The most commonly used dyes in textile industries are Azo dyes with –N=N- (azo) group, Methyl Orange (MO), Methylene Blue (MB) and Rhodamine B (RhB). The degradation of these dyes in textile wastewaters will be study under visible light using aqueous suspension of Bi₂Fe₄O₉, g-C₃N₄ and Bi₂Fe₄O₉/2D g-C₃N₄ photocatalyst. For the treatment of real textile wastewater, samples will be collected from different nearby textile mills. It is expected that our nanocomposite films will have degradation efficiency above ~95%. Therefore, the proposed research work will be novel with respect to the fabrication of next generation high performance photocatalyst possessing chemical and thermal stability and its application for treatment of textile dye wastewater using fundamentally optimized large-scale photoreactor.

Bismuth Ferrite, g-C3N4, Textile effluents, Z-scheme photocatalysis, Photodegradation, Nanocomposite thin films