CoTiO3/Ag3VO4 composite: A study on the role of CoTiO3 and the active species in the photocatalytic degradation of methylene blue

Abstract The role of CoTiO 3 and the possible active species in the methylene blue (MB) degradation over the visible-light-driven CoTiO 3 /Ag 3 VO 4 catalyst have firstly been investigated in this work. CoTiO 3 is found to play important roles in enhancing the visible light-harvesting ability of the composite and increasing electron–hole separation efficiency due to the hybrid effect between Ag 3 VO 4 and CoTiO 3 . The indirect probe experiments reveal that CoTiO 3 /Ag 3 VO 4 heterostructure provides large amount of active species, therefore a high photocatalytic activity could be obtained. The results clearly suggest that the photocatalytic MB degradation over this hybrid catalyst is mainly governed by direct hole oxidation.