Facile synthesis of YbVO₄, and YVO₄ nanostructures through MOF route for photocatalytic applications

Recently, one-dimensional nanomaterials gained significant attention in environmental remediation for the degradation and removal of various toxic pollutants in water bodies. Herein in this report, we prepared good visible-light response ytterbium and yttrium vanadates (YbVO₄, and YVO₄) photocatalyst with unique morphologies has been synthesized using simple MOF precursor followed by calcination route. The YbVO₄ exhibited bitter-gourd like structure and YVO₄ presented nano-rice structure as an added advantage for photocatalytic application. The as-synthesized samples were systematically characterized by XRD studies and transmission electron microscope (TEM) analysis and UV–vis diffuse reflectance spectra (DRS) studies, respectively. These one dimensional YbVO₄ and YVO₄ exhibited different absorption co-efficient from the UV to visible range with bandgap energies of 2.17 eV, and. 3.15 eV, respectively. The photocatalytic activities of YbVO₄ and YVO₄ have been investigated towards the photodegradation of aqueous methyl orange (MO) under the visible-light irradiation. Due to higher visible light absorption capacity with a narrow bandgap value of 2.17 eV, the YbVO₄ exhibited higher photocatalytic degradation ability towards the MO degradation. As a result, the YbVO₄ and YVO₄ showed the removal rate of about 81% and 65% removal towards the MO removal with 360 min irradiation time.