Revealing the stability of CuWO/g-CN nanocomposite for photocatalytic tetracycline degradation from the aqueous environment and DFT analysis.

Graphitic carbon nitride (g-CN) is an emerging metal-free photocatalyst, however, engineering the photocatalytic efficiency for the effective degradation of hazardous molecules is still challenging. An unstable and low bandgap CuWO was composited with g-CN to achieve synergistic benefits of tuning the visible light responsiveness and stability of CuWO. CuWO/g-CN nanocomposite exhibited a relatively high visible light absorption region and the bandgap was modified from 2.77 to 2.53 eV evidenced via UV-DRS. Moreover, the fast electron transfer rate was observed with CuWO/g-CN nanocomposite as confirmed using PL and photocurrent studies. XRD, FT-IR, and HR-TEM analyses signified the formation of CuWO/g-CN nanocomposite. CuWO/g-CN nanocomposite showed enhanced photocatalytic degradation of Tetracycline (TC) about ∼7.4 fold greater than pristine g-CN in 120 min. Notably, the OH and O radicals played a most significant role in photocatalytic TC degradation. Furthermore, the energy band structure, density of state, and Bader charge analyses of these molecules were performed.