An efficient visible-light-driven plasmonic photocatalyst with regard to graphene oxide(GO) hybridized Ag/Ag3PO4(Ag/Ag3PO4/GO) nanostructures has been facilely synthesized via a deposition-precipitation method.The synthesized nanostructures have been characterized by means of scanning electron microscopy(SEM),energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy(EDX),X-ray diffraction(XRD),UV-vis spectra,Fourier transform infrared spectra(FT-IR),X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy(XPS),and Raman spectra.It has been disclosed that compared with the bare Ag/Ag3PO4 nanospecies,the GO hybridized nanostructures display enhanced photocatalytic activity for the photodegradation of methyl orange pollutant under visible-light irradiation.It is suggested that the reinforced charge transfer and the suppressed recombination of electron-hole pairs in Ag/Ag3PO4 /GO,the smaller size of Ag/Ag3PO4 nanospecies in Ag/Ag3PO4/GO,all of which are the consequences of the hybridization of GO,are responsible for the enhanced photocatalytic performance.The investigation might open up new opportunities to obtain highly efficient Ag3PO4-based visible-light-driven plasmonic photocatalyst for the photodegradation of organic pollutants.
It is found that 5,10,15,20-tetrakis(4-sulfonatophenyl) porphyrin(TPPS),which is known to form J aggregates in water under low pH value,acts as a template for the hydrolyzing of organosilane.The nanotube structures of silica with 4 8 nm inner diameters are obtained,which is consistent with the height of TPPS J aggregates,indicating that TPPS J aggregates are indeed acting as the template for the sol-gel transcription.The TPPS J aggregation disappear when the medium pH value is shifted from acidic to basic,consequently formed silica nanostructures are amorphous nanosphere rather than nanofiber structures.In contrast,the copper phthalocyanine(TSCuPc),which does not exist as linear J aggregates,cannot induce the silica to form one dimensional nanofiber structures,implying that the templating effect of TPPS J aggregates for inorganic nanostructures.
The effect of pH on the conformation of surface alkyl groups and the structure of interfacial water molecules on poly[2-(dime-thylamino)ethyl methacrylate](PDEM) at the air/water interface were investigated with sum frequency generation vibrational spectroscopy(SFG-VS).At pH 4.1,the hydrogen bonding SFG spectra were similar to that of the air/pure water interface.As the pH increased from 5.4 to 9.6,the SFG intensities of both highly ordered hydrogen bonding(3200 cm-1 band) and less-ordered hydrogen bonding(3400 cm-1 band) were enhanced because of the charge-induced effect of deprotonated PDEM.The free OH peak disappeared completely because it was replaced by interfacial PDEM molecules.At pH 11.5,a new spectral band appeared at about 3580 cm-1 in the ppp and sps spectra,and this could be assigned to the C2v asymmetric stretching mode of the water molecules through molecular symmetry simulation.These hydrogen bonding structures are fully consistent with the conformational change of PDEM alkyl groups,and PDEM molecules act as a Hofmeister solvent.PDEM molecules are kosmotropic when they are charged and become more chaotropic as the pH increases.
In this investigation, the adsorption of benzonitrile at the air/water interface was addressed using vibrational sum-frequency spectroscopy. Using ppp and ssp polarization combinations, the authors detected the symmetric stretching mode of the cyano (CN) group and calculated the orientation of benzonitrile at the interface. In addition, the adsorption isotherm was determined in terms of the hyperpolarizability element by varying the bulk benzonitrile concentration. The adsorption energy was obtained from fitting this isotherm. This work will add to our understanding of chemical processes relevant to retention, degradation, and photolysis of benzonitriles in the environment.
Understanding and control of the surface properties such as molecular orientations are of great importance in numerous applications of ionic liquids. However, there remain discrepancies among the previous experimental and theoretical studies on the surface orientation and structures of room temperature ionic liquids(RTIL) systems. In this article, the orientation of 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium([bmin]) cation at the air/liquid interface of a characteristic RTIL, 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium hexafluorophosphate([bmim][PF6]), was investigated by the sum frequency generation vibrational spectroscopy(SFG-VS). Detailed polarization and experimental configuration analyses of the SFG-VS spectra showed the possibility of a small spectral splitting in the CH3 symmetric stretching region, which can be further attributed to the probable existence of multiple orientations for the interfacial [bmim] cations. In addition, the(N)–CH3 vibrations were absent, ruling out the prediction by several recent molecular dynamics simulations which state that portions of the [bmim] cations orient with a standing-up(N)–CH3 group at the ionic liquid surface. Hence, new realistic theoretical models have to be developed to reflect the complex nature of the ionic liquid surface.
