Sodium Tungsten Oxide Bronze Nanowires Bundles in Adsorption of Methylene Blue Dye under UV and Visible Light Exposure

Abstract

This paper describes the analysis and characterization of NayWOx bronze nanowires bundles and evaluation of their effective adsorption of methylene blue dye (MB). The Na-doped WOx bronze nanowires bundles were first synthesized via a simple solvothermal method, which were then fully characterized by using different techniques including TEM, XRD, XPS and UV-Vis, to validate the successful Na+ insertion into the WOx framework. The adsorption activities of the resulting NayWOx bronze nanowires bundles, compared with the undoped WOx form, were investigated by evaluating the adsorption effect on methylene blue under both UV and visible light irradiations. An enhanced adsorption performance of the Na-doped WOx bronze samples was recorded, which demonstrated a 90% of removal efficiency of the MB under different conditions (dark, visible and UV light). Moreover, the NayWOx bronze samples also offered a 4 times better kinetic rate of MB removal than the plain WOx nanowires.