Solution Combustion Synthesis of YVO4 Nanopowder Using V2O5.nH2O Gel: Photodegradation Studies

In the present work, yttrium orthovanadate (YVO4) nanopowder has been synthesized via solution combustion route using citric acid as fuel. The primary aim is to establish a facile solution combustion reaction to produce YVO4 nanopowder with lower band gap using vanadium pentoxide (V2O5.nH2O) gel as precursor and then investigation of its photocatalytic activity against anionic and cationic dyes in presence of visible light. The powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD) analysis reveals the formation of pure YVO4 with tetragonal phase having crystallite size ∼30.95 nm. Scanning electron micrograph (SEM) exhibits highly porous nature of the product. Breauner-Emmet-Teller (BET) surface area analysis of YVO4 nanopowder shows a relatively large specific surface area of ∼46.57 m2.g–1. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) exhibits uniform particle size distribution with average particle sizes varying in the range of 20-100 nm. The band gap of 2.16 eV is calculated using the ultraviolet diffuse reflectance spectrum (UV-DRS) of YVO4. The photoluminescence spectrum of YVO4 nanopowder shows emission peak at 572.2 nm. The photocatalytic degradation of methylene blue (MB) using YVO4 as photocatalyst shows 92% decolorization in presence of visible radiation. Photocatalytic activity has also been extended to investigate the degradation of amaranth dye and rhodamine-B (Rh-B) under visible light irradiation which reveals 80% degradation of amaranth dye but Rh-B shows only 65% decolorization using YVO4 nanopowder. Hence YVO4 nanopowder shows good photocatalytic activity for MB and amaranth dye compared to Rh-B. GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT