Plant extract assisted synthesis of reduced graphene oxide sheet and the photocatalytic performances on cationic and anionic dyes to decontaminate wastewater

Sanjukta Ghosh, Piu Das and Moni Baskey (Sen)

Abstract

Green synthesis of reduced graphene oxide (RGO) has gained momentum over chemical methods due to its environmental compatibility. The present study deals with the green synthesis of the RGO sheet using the bark extract of Alstonia scholaris by the simple heating method in less time duration. Different characterizations such as x-ray diffraction (XRD), ultraviolet-visible (UV-Vis) spectroscopy, Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy confirm the formation of RGO and the transmission electron microscopy (TEM) study shows that the synthesized material is a few-layered RGO sheet. The result of the photoluminescence (PL) study explores the partial reduction of graphene oxide (GO). The photocatalytic activities of the synthesized product were investigated via photo-degradation of methylene blue (MB) and methyl orange (MO). The results show that the synthesized RGO is more fruitful in cationic dye (MB) degradation than that of anionic dye (MO) depending on the electrostatic interaction between RGO and the dyes. The rate of photocatalytic performance of the nanocomposite on MB dye is 40 times greater than that of MO dye.