Microwave Asisted preparation of Graphene Sulfonic Acid/TiO2 nanocomposite and its Photocatalytic Activity for degradation of Eriochrome Black T in Water

Environmental pollution is one of the biggest problems in recent years and this problem is growing annually due to increasing population and the use of more synthetic products [1]. Thus protection of environment from pollution is major factor to improvement the quality of life. Water pollution is one of the main problems and the lack of uncontaminated water in environment threatens the life and lead to critical disorders. Organic pollutant especially dyes caused numerous problems due to dangerous properties such as toxicity, carcinogenetic, mutagenic [2]. They are mainly soluble in water and stable in various conditions including in the presence of light and temperature [3]. Thus, a large number of efforts in researches have been focused to find the best procedure to remove these contaminants from water. Among the semiconductor photocatalysts, TiO2 is environmentally benign, nontoxic, high photocatalytic efficiency, low cost, high abundant and other several advantages [4]. TiO2 is a photocatalyst with narrow excitation capacity, under UV conditions, because of the large band gap energy (3.2 ev) and high rate recombination of electron-hoe and low adsorption capacity. Thus, the use of TiO2 composites and derivatives to overcome these disadvantages, especially using visible light as exciting radiation, is active route in researches [5]. In this research work graphene sulfonic acid (G-SO3H) have been prepared and its composite with TiO2 under microwave irradiation have been synthesized and characterized. The photocatalytic degradation of Eriochrome Black T dye in the presence of G-SO3H.TiO2 nanocomposite and visible light have been studied.