A facile method for the preparation of titania-coated magnetic porous silica and its photocatalytic activity under UV or visible light

In this article, we reported a facile method for the preparation of titania-coated magnetic porous silica which can be magnetically separated. The prepared samples were characterized by XRD, BET, SEM and vibrating sample magnetometry (VSM). The photocatalytic activity of the samples was determined by degradation of reactive brilliant red X-3B under either UV or visible irradiation, and compared to Degussa P25. The photocatalytic activity of as prepared composite photocatalyst in degradation of X-3B has dramatic enhancement compared to that of P25 titania under both UV and visible-light irradiation. Furthermore, our method shows an additional advantage for its versatility, which allows the preparation of composite photocatalyst with tunable magnetic properties.