Synthesis, characterisation and photocatalytic performance of ZnS coupled Ag2S nanoparticles: A remediation model for environmental pollutants

Maryam Abbasi; Uzaira Rafique; Ghulam Murtaza; Muhammad Aqeel Ashraf

doi:10.1016/j.arabjc.2017.12.017

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11 (

); 827-837

doi:

10.1016/j.arabjc.2017.12.017

Synthesis, characterisation and photocatalytic performance of ZnS coupled Ag₂S nanoparticles: A remediation model for environmental pollutants

Maryam Abbasi^{^a}, Uzaira Rafique^{^a}, Ghulam Murtaza^{^a}, Muhammad Aqeel Ashraf^{^b,^c,⁎}

a Department of Environmental Science, Fatima Jinnah Women University, Rawalpindi, Pakistan

b Department of Environmental Science & Engineering, China University of Geosciences, Wuhan, China

c International Water, Air & Soil Conservation Society 59200 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

⁎Corresponding author at: Department of Environmental Science & Engineering, China University of Geosciences, Wuhan, China. chemaqeel@yahoo.com (Muhammad Aqeel Ashraf)

Received: 2017-9-16, Accepted: 2017-12-19, Published: 2017-09-01

Disclaimer:
This article was originally published by Elsevier and was migrated to Scientific Scholar after the change of Publisher.

Peer review under responsibility of King Saud University.

Abstract

The growing demand of industries has led to environmental degradation due to excessive release of toxic chemicals. Nanotechnology has developed to combat the impacts integrated with industrial revolution. The present investigation proposes a remediation model for toxic dyes and poly aromatic hydrocarbons by effective use of nanotechnology. For this purpose, zinc sulphide (ZnS), silver sulfide (Ag₂S) and bimetallic ZnS-Ag₂S are synthesized from a single source precursor and evaluated as potential photocatalytic agents. The synthesized nanoparticles were characterized by a range of techniques like UV–visible, PL, XRD, EDX, TEM and TGA. The results indicated that prepared nanoparticles were crystalline, spherical in shape, possess obvious atomic planes with a size in the range of 6–12 nm.

Each of the synthesized material was tested as potential photocatalyst candidate for the degradation of representative azo-dyes (Crystal Violet, Congo Red) and polyaromatic hydrocarbons (Naphthalene, Phenanthrene and Pyrene) under visible light irradiation source. The degradation efficiency of the synthesized nanoparticles was calculated to be more than 70% for Crystal Violet and 80%for Congo Red upon contact with the dye solutions for 50 min and pseudo second order kinetic model was found to be the best fit. The synthesized nanoparticles were also effective in its own significance for the degradation of polyaromatic hydrocarbons. The fragmentation study of polyaromatic hydrocarbons using nanoparticles postulates that phthalic acid pathway is the predominant mechanism for PAHs. It is recommended that environmental compartment with mix pollutants can conveniently be treated with a single material to an appreciable extent. The study offers economical and environment friendly remediation model.

Keywords

Single source precursor

Azo-dyes

Poly aromatic hydrocarbons

Environmental remediation

Photocatalysis

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1 Introduction

Natural environment is continuously being subjected to effects of chemicals emitted during anthropogenic as well as natural processes. The accumulation of these chemicals is generating huge burden on the environment. For instance, industrial wastewater and even drinking water is manifested with extremely dangerous and toxic chemicals that are resistant to natural degradation (Li et al., 2011; Halim et al., 2017; Roslan et al., 2017; Nordin et al., 2017 ). Efforts for the prevention of environmental dispersion and sustained applied research in the area of environmental remediation (Hu et al., 2005) are required on war footing. Various remediation models having environment friendly approach are proposed to protect the environment from harmful effects of a wide variety of toxic inorganic and organic pollutants like dyes and polyaromatic hydrocarbons (Rahman et al., 2017). The concerns arise because the parent compound and degradation products of these pollutants are highly hazardous, carcinogenic and toxic(De’nan et al., 2017; Hassan and Ismail, 2017). Dyes have been widely used as additives and colorant in many industries like textile, paper, plastic, leather, ceramic, cosmetics, ink, food processing, etc (Shamsipur and Rajbi, 2014; Ong et al., 2016; Ismail and Hanafiah, 2017 ). Over the years, synthetic dyes are overwhelmingly used due to their high performance and cost effectiveness. Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons are another class of environmental pollutants that have received grave concern because of adverse impacts on ecosystems and human health (Guo et al., 2007; Fatone et al., 2011; Aziz and Hanafiah, 2017 ). PAHs even in trace amounts can be hazardous and can easily bioaccumulate in food chains (Khan et al., 2008). PAHs have been identified in industrial and municipal wastewater (Dai et al., 2007; Manoli and Samara, 2008), as a result of industrial production, transformation, and waste incineration (Omar et al., 2006). Therefore, the development of remediation model is continuously discussed by the scientific community and policy makers. Various physical, chemical and biological techniques have been investigated and found to exhibit drawbacks, such as producing a more concentrated pollutant-containing phase (Lachheb et al., 2002; Lin and Peng, 1996; Mansur et al., 2014 ). On the contrary, photocatalysis method is determined to be cost effective and efficient (Shamsipur et al., 2013; Alnuaimi et al., 2007; Khan et al., 2017; Aslam et al., 2017; Razali et al., 2017a ). Heterogenous photocatalysis results in mineralization of pollutants consuming low energy and possess environmental compatibility (Su et al., 2008; Zukauskas et al., 2010; Razali et al., 2017b ).

Nanoparticles have recently emerged as promising candidates for photocatalytic applications. The unique physico chemical properties like higher surface area-to-volume ratio, size confinement and significant increase in the band gap energy, producing a higher redox potential in the system have been extensively examined for waste water treatment (Qu et al., 2013; Alamo-Nole et al., 2013).

In this regard, semiconductor nanoparticles with different combinations of metal sulfides are applied as potential catalysts for the degradation of pollutants (Reddy et al., 2007; Wu and Chern, 2006). CdS, CdSe, PbS and Ag₂S have narrow band gap, good chemical stability and good optical limiting properties (Kumari et al., 2014; Meng et al., 2012; Wang et al., 2008; Xiaodong et al., 2008 ) that led to variety of application such as in solar cells, photo-detectors, optical filters and oxygen sensors (Lu et al., 2005; Wang et al., 2008; Pourahmad, 2012; Anthony, 2009 ).

However, for the synthesis of semiconductor nanoparticles high temperature pyrolysis of organometallic precursors (Massadeh et al., 2009), ion exchange method (Sundarrajan et al., 2012), hydrothermal (Wang et al., 2006), photochemical (Lin et al., 2005) and electrochemical (Gichuhi et al., 2000) methods have been commonly applied.

Nowadays, more simple, efficient and single step method for the synthesis of semiconductor nanoparticles is to use single source precursor to eliminate nanostructure defects. It is believed that this method is applicable for large scale synthesis of various size and shaped semiconductor nanoparticles at low temperatures (Devendran et al., 2014). Hence, the present research is a step forward in the synthesis of ZnS, Ag₂S and ZnS/Ag₂S bimetallic nanoparticles using zinc and silver di-ethyldithiocarbamate precursors and its applications for the degradation of pollutants.

2 Synthesis and characterization

ZnS and Ag₂S nanoparticles were synthesized by decomposing single molecular precursors in the presence of dry oleylamine and oleic acid. In addition, synthesis of bi-metallic nanoparticles was also attempted in which Zinc sulphide precursor was decomposed initially followed by addition of Silversulphide precursor resulting in the formation of bi-metallic nanoparticles in a single pot. ZnS-Ag₂S nanoparticles was also synthesized by varying the concentration of Zinc to silver dithiocarbamates. Synthesis protocols is given in the Supporting Information S1.

The synthesized nanoparticles were analyzed by using UV–Visible spectroscopy (UV–Vis), Photoluminescence spectrofluorometry (PL), X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), Energy Dispersive X-ray (EDX), Transmission electron microscopy (TEM), high resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) and Thermogravimetry (TGA).

3 Results and discussion

The present investigation was an attempt to explore the potential of synthesized nanoparticles as degradation agents. The characteristic optical features were followed using UV–Visible and Photoluminescence spectrophotometer.

The full UV–Vis absorption spectra from (300–800) nm depicted a L-shaped curve with the band edge appears at relatively lower (325 nm) and higher (500 nm) wavelengths for ZnS and Ag₂S, respectively (see Fig. 1a). The subsequent decrease in absorption with increase in wavelength with no discrete absorption band is recorded for the synthesized Ag₂S particles. This could be attributed to specific electronic property of Ag₂S. The results are supported by Xie et al. (2009) and Dong et al. (2013). The absorption pattern of ZnS/Ag₂S bi-metallic nanoparticles with varying combination of Zn to Ag (see Fig. 1b) shows a clear shift to higher wavelengths in comparison to pure ZnS.

UV–Visible absorption spectra of (a) ZnS & Ag2S and (b) ZnS/Ag2S bi-metallic nanoparticles.

The emission spectra of nanoparticles are given in Fig. 2(a–c). The individual ZnS and ZnS doped with different amount of Ag (ZnS/Ag₂S) demonstrates a random pattern. The randomness in emission pattern of nanomaterials is dependent on morphology and the preparation parameters. It is also observed that pure ZnS shows maxima peak intensity at 400 nm, whereas Silver doped ZnS shifts the maxima towards longer wavelength (450 nm) as depicted in Fig. 2a and b, respectively. Further, formation of bi-metallic nanoparticles, i.e., doping of Ag₂S on ZnS is witnessed by a characteristic peak at 593 nm (Babu and Khadar, 2011; Murugadoss and Chattopadhyay, 2008) of appreciable intensity. It is also noted that higher is the molar ratio, more is the peak intensity. In addition, few weaker peaks are also noted. These bands may be attributed to the release of trapped luminescent particles, (Hu et al., 2004), recombination of interstitial sulfur, or interstitial zinc and sulfur vacancies (Becker and Bard, 1983; Liu et al., 2014 ). Photoluminescence spectrum of Ag₂S (Fig. 2c) exhibited a symmetric emission band with a maxima peak centered at 770 nm.

Photoluminescence spectra of (a) ZnS, (b) ZnS/Ag2S and (c) Ag2S nanoparticles.

The band gap energies calculated for ZnS, Ag₂S and ZnS/Ag₂S bi-metallic nanoparticles are presented in Fig. S4(a and b). The band gap values from Tauq equation are found to be 3.9 eV, 2.2 eV and 3.68 eV for ZnS, Ag₂S and ZnS/Ag₂S, respectively. On comparison of ZnS and ZnS/Ag₂S demonstrates the comparable band gap. However, bi-metallic shows relatively lower band gap value due to deposition of Ag₂S on the surface (Sadollahkhani et al., 2015; Hernández et al., 2014; Liao et al., 2008 ). It is expected that coupling the material with low band gap semiconductors (e.g. Ag₂S) enhances the photocatalytic activity due to enhancement of charge separation and photoabsorption even under visible light (Liu et al., 2013).

X-ray diffraction patterns of the synthesized nanoparticles are represented in Fig. 3(a–c). ZnS nanoparticles exhibit crystalline nature with sharp peaks at different angles of 28.5°, 33°, 47.5°, 56.2°, 69.5° and 76.8°. The lattice planes (1 1 1), (2 0 0), (2 2 0), (3 1 1), (4 0 0), and (3 3 1) are in good agreement with cubic geometry (JCPDS Card No. 5-0566). X-ray diffraction pattern of Ag₂S nanoparticles is represented in Fig. 3b. All of the characteristic diffraction peaks matched with the monoclinic Ag₂S and the lattice constants were a = 4.229 Å, b = 6.931 Å, and c = 7.862 Å (JCPDS No. 14-0072). The main diffraction peaks observed at 2 Theta such as 31.5°, 34.7°, 43.15° are assigned to the diffraction planes (−1 1 2), (0 2 2), (1 2 2) of Ag₂S. Further, the distinct diffraction peaks suggest the crystalline nature of the sample. The results are comparable to other researches done by Murugadoss et al. (2016) and Du et al. (2010).

XRD spectra of nanoparticles (a) ZnS, (b) Ag2S and (c) ZnS/Ag2S with varying Zn:Ag ratios.

ZnS/Ag₂S bimetallic nanoparticles are synthesized by adding different ratios of Zn:Ag (1:7, 1:13, 1:19, 1:32, 1:99) in respective order. It can be seen that each added concentration retains the crystal lattice of ZnS (base material). However, the peaks are slightly shifted towards lower 2 Theta values (see Fig. 3c). This might be attributed to the larger atomic number (47 a.m.u) and larger ionic radii of Ag. An interesting observation recorded is the emergence of new peaks at relatively higher ratios of Zn:Ag. This clearly indicates the incorporation of silver element into the ZnS blende. The gradual increase in concentration of silver also corresponds to increase in intensity of the ZnS/Ag₂S peaks. From the XRD data, it can be concluded that route adopted in the present investigation (i.e., using single source precursor) provides the successful synthesis of nanoparticles.

EDX analysis of the synthesized nanoparticles is an important tool to measure the atomic percentages of the elements. Fig. S5 in the Supporting Information represents the image and data sheet obtained from EDX. The images clearly indicate the presence of main elements with no other peak. This suggests the formation of pure product.

The nanoparticle of ZnS shows an appreciable amount of both ingredients, however, sulfur is almost ten times more than zinc (see Table S5). Ag₂S shows the elemental composition consisted of element Ag and S in the 1.8:1, respectively. These results are in close agreement to the stoichiometry of bulk Ag₂S reported by Jiang et al. (2007). The presence of Ag in ZnS/Ag₂S bimetallic nanoparticles is in sequence to the proportion added. EDX data clearly depicts that higher is the Zn: Ag ratio, more is silver by weight in bi-metallic nanoparticles.

Figs. 4–6 depicts the electron diffraction images of synthesized nanoparticles. The synthesized ZnS and Ag₂S nanoparticles are found to be spherical in shape with size range of 6.28–8.43 nm and 8–12 nm respectively. Selected area electron diffraction (SAED) image of ZnS nanoparticles reveals three concentric sharp rings at lattice planes of (1 1 1), (2 2 0) and (3 1 1) that commensurate with the cubic structure (see Fig. 4c). The results of SAED in Fig. 5 for Ag₂S clearly manifests the rings corresponding to the planes (1 1 1), (−1 1 2), (−1 2 3) and (0 4 1) of monoclinic α-Ag₂S. Same conclusion is drawn earlier from XRD results. Further probe into the artifact of structure through high-resolution TEM (HRTEM) revealed the crystal structures and obvious atomic planes for single particle. HRTEM shows clear lattice fringes, the width of which is calculated to be 0.30 nm (see Fig. 4d). This is in good agreement with d-spacing for (1 1 1) lattice plane (Pal et al., 2013)of ZnS nanoparticles. The interplane distance of the lattice fringes of 0.287 nm in the nanoparticles could be indexed as (−1 1 2) facet of monoclinic Ag₂S.

(a and b) TEM images of ZnS nanoparticles, (c) SAED image and (d) HRTEM images of a single ZnS nanoparticle.

(a and b) TEM image of Ag2S nanoparticles and (c) SAED image with HRTEM images of a single Ag2S nanoparticle.

(a and b) TEM images of Bimetallic ZnS/Ag2S nanoparticles, (c) SAED image and (d) HRTEM images of a single ZnS/Ag2S.

Similar results are obtained for ZnS/Ag₂S nanoparticles (see Fig. 6). However, the particle size was much larger (9.58–11.37 nm) than ZnS particles due to addition of Ag₂S. Another distinguishing feature is the imaging of Ag₂S as spotted pattern when examined under SAED.

The Thermogravimetric (TG) curves of nanoparticles are illustrated in Fig. S6. The ZnS nanoparticles show two steps decomposition with comparable weight loss. It is also noted that half (almost 50%) of the total material is decomposed and another half is retained as residue (see Table S6). TG curve of Ag₂S nanoparticles shows three steps decomposition. The weight loss in 1st, 2nd and 3rd step is 2.24%, 6.09%, and 5.30% respectively (see Fig. S6b). The initial weight loss at temperatures lower than 200 °C mainly corresponds to desorption of water (Dasari and Guttena, 2016). On the other hand, higher temperatures (425–540 °C) most likely induces the degradation of oleylamine and stearic acid (Kasthuriet al., 2009; Shakouri-Arani and Salavati-Niasari, 2014). The left-over residue is significant (86.4% by weight) even at higher temperatures (600 °C) stamping the better thermal stability of the synthesized Ag₂S nanoparticles.

On the other hand, ZnS/Ag₂S nanoparticles decompose minimally indicating more thermal stability. An interesting observation recorded is the highest decomposition temperature (598 °C) as common feature of both nanoparticles. The decomposition pattern of bimetallic particles suggests that Ag₂S induces stability in ZnS/Ag₂S. This is further supported by the comparable residue retained by Ag₂S nanoparticle and comparable highest decomposition temperature (see Table S6). The TG study concludes that the nanoparticles containing Ag₂S as ingredient are more thermally stable.

3.1

3.1 Photocatalytic degradation of dyes

The photocatalytic activity of the synthesized nanoparticles was evaluated for the degradation of Azo-dyes (crystal Violet (CV) and congo Red (CR)) and Poly Aromatic Hydrocarbons (naphthalene, phenanthrene and pyrene) under visible light for 50 min. (Detail of the batch experiment is given in Supporting Information S3).

The application of synthesized materials for degradation of Crystal Violet (CV) and Congo Red (CR) is measured as the ratio of change in absorbance to the initial absorbance (Liu et al., 2014). The degradation rate of CV and CR as a function of contact time with the synthesized nanoparticles is graphically presented in Figs. 7 and 8(a–c). It demonstrated that presence of all the synthesized nanoparticles initiated the process of degradation of CV and CR upon contact and it gradually increased with the passage of time. It was noted that intensity of the adsorption band of CV and CR at 585 nm and 498 nm, respectively decreased rapidly under light irradiation. The amplitude of absorbance decreases with increasing irradiation time. This is indicative of degradation potential of each induced material. This could be attributed to the degradation of characteristic color absorbing species (chromophores) in the dyes leading to discoloration (Mansur et al., 2014). It is to be noted that discoloration of dyes upon addition of nanoparticles and exposure to visible light was taken as a measure of degradation of respective dyes.

UV visible absorption spectra of the photocatalytic degradation of Crystal violet (a) ZnS, (b) ZnS/Ag2S and (c) Ag2S nanoparticles.

UV visible absorption spectra of the photocatalytic degradation of Congo Red (a) ZnS (b) ZnS/Ag2S and (c) Ag2S nanoparticles.

The results indicated that the nanoparticles degraded the dyes as a function of time (See Fig. 9). The effect of initial time (upto 15 min) was more pronounced followed by saturation using ZnS, Ag₂S and ZnS/Ag₂S bimetallic nanoparticles. It also suggests that Ag₂S and ZnS/Ag₂S bimetallic nanoparticles are relatively more efficient in case of CV and CR degradation respectively. It is important to mention that illuminated blank solution (not having QD) with visible light irradiation did not show any detectable degradation. This clearly reveals that synthesized materials have good degradation potential.

Degradation (in percentage) of (a) Crystal violet, (b) Congo Red.

The relatively higher photocatalytic activities may be attributed to the better separation of electron–hole pairs, whereas lower performance is due to rapid recombination of electron–hole pairs (Murugadoss et al., 2016). Depending on the band gap position (Reddy et al., 2016), the photogenerated electrons and holes transfer to the surface (Wu and Lee, 2016) to react with the dye molecule and thus prevent electron–hole recombination. It can safely be concluded that synthesized nanoparticles have more potential for the degradation of Congo Red as compared to Crystal Violet.

Different kinetic models have been proposed to describe the rate of degradation with respect to time. Pseudo–second order kinetic model derivation (Wang and Wang, 2007) is expressed as follows: $\frac{{dq}_{t}}{d_{t}} = k_{2} (q_{e} - q_{t}) 2$ .

Where k₂ is rate constant, q_e and q_t is the amount (mg L⁻¹) at equilibrium and at time t, respectively. The linear form of the model after integration and applying the boundary conditions of qt = 0 at t = 0 and qt = qt at t = t, is: $\frac{t}{q_{t}} = \frac{1}{k_{2} q_{e}^{2}} + (\frac{1}{q_{e}}) t$ .

Fig. S7 shows the fitting result of second order kinetic model based on the experimental degradation data. The excellent agreement of experimental data to pseudo second order model postulates that decolorization follows the chemisorption mechanism. The kinetics is fast and efficiency of each material is well suited to the model.

3.2

3.2 Photocatalytic degradation of poly aromatic hydrocarbons

In the present investigation, three representative polyaromatic hydrocarbons are eluted from GC column after contact with synthesized nanoparticles in a batch mode. The results are summarized in the Table S8 as a function of retention time. The reference PAHs show lower (4.2 min) retention time for naphthalene and highest (8.0 min) for pyrene. The contact of synthesized nanoparticles with naphthalene, phenanthrene and pyrene depicts significant reduction in peak area in comparison to standard (reference PAHs) solutions. It is observed that higher is the number of rings, less is the change in peak area.

The GC data obtained is computed for degradation of selected polyaromatic hydrocarbons. The results are graphically presented in Fig. 10. It is generally observed that increase in irradiation contact time results in increase in percent degradation of PAHs. However, this effect is more pronounced for the degradation of phenanthrene. The degradation efficiency of the synthesized nanoparticles is more than 80% for PAHs.

Degradation (in percentage) of PAHs using synthesized materials (a) Naphthalene, (b) Phenanthrene and (c) Pyrene.

The eluent of the batch from GC column was subjected to MS detector to determine the fragmentation pattern for the degradation of selected PAHs. It is to mention that eluent having visible light irradiation for optimum time (90 min) was analyzed for Mass spectrometry. The reference (standard) solution of naphthalene, phenanthrene and pyrene depicts 100% relative intensity for the parent compound at m/z 128, m/z 178 and m/z 202 respectively. The application of synthesized nanoparticles as photocatalyst agent for the degradation of polyaromatic hydrocarbons reveals encouraging results. The significant reduction in the intensity of molecular ion peak upon contact of nanoparticles shows successful decomposition of the PAHs. The maximum reduction in the intensity of molecular ion peak was found to be 27%, 41% and 17% for naphthalene, phenanthrene and pyrene (see Table 1). It is important to note that new degradation products appear at longer retention. The fragment at m/z 149 likely represents the formation of phthalic acid, mono-(2-ethylhexyl) ester. Hassan et al. (2015) reported formation of phthalic acid. The fragmentation pattern of phthalate ester shows a predominant peak at m/z 149 along with fragments at m/z 57 and 71. These peaks are characteristic of 2-ethylhexyl moiety, also witnessed by (Pietrogrande et al., 2003). Phthalic acid was also found to be the degradation product of naphthalene, phenanthrene and pyrene reported by Felix et al. (2014); Hadibarata and Tachibana (2010) and Vaidya et al. (2017). The fragmentation study of polyaromatic hydrocarbons using synthesized material postulates that phthalic acid pathway is the predominant mechanism for PAHs.

Table 1 Fragmentation pattern for the degradation of poly aromatic hydrocarbons.

Sample	Retention time	m/z of fragments (Relative Intensity)
Naphthalene (Standard)	4.2	75(15), 102(28), 128(100)
ZnS + Naphthalene	4.2	58(100), 128(55)
ZnS + Naphthalene	10.2	57(33), 71(26), 149(100), 167(41)
ZnS/Ag₂S + Naphthalene	4.2	58(100), 102(6), 128(78)
ZnS/Ag₂S + Naphthalene	10.4	57(34), 71(28), 113(11), 149(100), 167(42)
Ag₂S + Naphthalene	4.2	58(100), 128(27)
Ag₂S + Naphthalene	10.2	57(31), 71(22), 149(100)
Phenenthrene (Standard)	6.4	76(13), 176(18), 178(100)
ZnS + Phenenthrene	6.4	58(100), 76(10), 152(11), 178(84)
ZnS + Phenenthrene	10.4	57(31), 71(27), 104(5), 113(12), 149(100)
ZnS/Ag₂S + Phenenthrene	6.4	58(100), 76(11), 89(9.36), 178(52)
ZnS/Ag₂S + Phenenthrene	10.2	57(35), 71(23), 104(7),113(10), 149(100)
Ag₂S + Phenenthrene	6.4	58(100), 178(41)
Ag₂S + Phenenthrene	10.2	57(32), 71(27), 113(13), 149(100), 279(10)
Pyrene (Standard)	8.0	101(27), 202(100)
ZnS + Pyrene	8.0	58(100), 202(17)
ZnS + Pyrene	10.2	57(31), 71(25), 113(11), 149(100), 167(41)
ZnS/Ag₂S + Pyrene	8.0	58(100), 101(13), 202(58)
ZnS/Ag₂S + Pyrene	10.2	57(33),71(23), 113(10), 149(100),167(38), 279(11)
Ag₂S + Pyrene	8.0	58(100), 202(64), 101(17)
Ag₂S + Pyrene	10.2	57(34), 71(27), 113(11), 149(100)

4 Conclusions

The following conclusions can be drawn from the study:

The route adopted of using single source precursor proved it a successful approach for the synthesis of ZnS, Ag₂S and ZnS/Ag₂S bimetallic nanoparticles.
The complete characterization revealed the structures to be spherical in shape, crystalline, particle size in nano range (6–12 nm) and possess obvious atomic planes.
Ag₂S was found to induce thermal stability in ZnS/Ag₂S bimetallic nanoparticles.
The synthesized particles were proven to be potential photocatalyst candidates for the degradation of both cationic and anionic dyes to an appreciable extent.
Another important finding of the study is the common occurrence of fragment i.e., phthalic acid, mono-(2-ethylhexyl) ester (m/z 149) as main degradation product. It is important to note that new degradation product is less hazardous than parent compound.
The study recommends the successful application of synthesized materials as sustainable, economical and potential alternatives to commercial photocatalyst agents for the degradation of environmental pollutants.

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Appendix A

Supplementary material

Supplementary data associated with this article can be found, in the online version, at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.arabjc.2017.12.017.

Appendix A

Supplementary material

Supplementary Figs. S1–S7 and Tables S1–S8

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Introduction

Synthesis and characterization

Results and discussion

Photocatalytic degradation of dyes
Photocatalytic degradation of poly aromatic hydrocarbons

Conclusions

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Synthesis, characterisation and photocatalytic performance of ZnS coupled Ag2S nanoparticles: A remediation model for environmental pollutants

Abstract

Keywords

Single source precursor

Azo-dyes

Poly aromatic hydrocarbons

Environmental remediation

Photocatalysis

1 Introduction

2 Synthesis and characterization

3 Results and discussion

3.1 Photocatalytic degradation of dyes

3.2 Photocatalytic degradation of poly aromatic hydrocarbons

4 Conclusions

References

Appendix A

Supplementary material

Appendix A

Supplementary material

Supplementary Figs. S1–S7 and Tables S1–S8

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Synthesis, characterisation and photocatalytic performance of ZnS coupled Ag₂S nanoparticles: A remediation model for environmental pollutants