Efficient visible-light piezophototronic activity of ZnO-Ag8S hybrid for degradation of organic dye molecule

The usage of semiconductor photocatalyst has been received great attention in recent years due to their wide application in photocatalytic water-splitting and degradation of pollutants in waste water and environmental remediation application, etc. In this study, we demonstrated the efficient synergistically piezo-phototronic effect (which is combined activity of piezo- and photocatalytic) of ZnO-Ag8S hybrid for the degradation of an organic dye. Hydrothermal method was adopted for the growth of ZnO tetrapods on the surface of glass substrate. Ag8S modified ZnO obtained by successive ionic layer adsorption and reaction (SILAR) method, has shown an increased photo-decolorization rate compared with bare photocatalyst. This piezo-photocatalytic hybrid material plays an important role in electron trapping and also hindered the charge carrier recombination. The photo-degradation mechanism of Rhodamine-B dye with Ag8S modified piezoelectric ZnO hybrid material has shown 7.3 fold increment when compared with bare photocatalyst. Our study reveals that ZnO-Ag8S hybrid shows a better visible-light piezophototronic activity which further explores a new catalyst design approach for existing photocatalytic application in environmental remediation.