The smart magnetic nanocomposites have been doped to diminish the energy bandgap of the photocatalyst and to permit recovering of the photocatalyst after the wastewater treatment. The core-shell Fe3O4@TiO2 nanocomposite was synthesised by the hydrothermal method using titanium butoxide as a precursor. The nanocomposites were examined by XRD, VSM, UV-Vis, and TEM techniques. The energy band gap of core-shell Fe3O4@TiO2 nanocomposite is 3.5 eV. Doping of copper with a concentration of 1, 2, and 3 wt% into TiO2 shell was done to increase the performance of photocatalyst. The Fe3O4/PVP@TiO2@Cu photocatalyst was used for dye wastewater treatment. The energy bandgap decreased to 2.2 eV after copper doping into the TiO2 shell specified that copper-doped nanocomposite could be an outstanding photocatalyst. The photocatalytic activity was carried out using methylene blue(MB) and methyl orange (MO) under sunlight. About 65% of methylene blue and 85% of methyl orange degradation was done using Cu (3wt %) doped Fe3O4@TiO2 nanocomposite. These photocatalysts can be easily withdrawn with a magnetic field. The Fe3O4/PVP@TiO2@Cu photocatalyst has been demonstrated to be very functional or effective for the degradation of MB and MO dyes using solar illumination.
Keywords: Fe3O4@TiO2; dye; hydrothermal; nanocomposite; photocatalyst.