Reduced graphene oxide–cuprous oxide composite via facial deposition for photocatalytic dye-degradation

Highlights: •Cubic Cu2O were effectively loaded on n-propylamine (PA) intercalated graphene oxide. •The addition of PA on the carbon sheets supports the stable structure of the composites. •Cu2O/PA/rGO showed superior adsorption capacity and photocatalytic activity. -- Abstract: Cubic Cu2O nanoparticles have been successfully synthesized on n-propylamine (PA) intercalated graphene oxide (GO) with uniform distribution followed with a subsequent hydrazine hydrate reduction process to generate Cu2O/PA/rGO composite. For comparison, Cu2O conjugated reduced graphene oxide (Cu2O/rGO) composite was also synthesized using the same method. The as-prepared Cu2O/PA/rGO and Cu2O/rGO nanocomposites are characterized by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), X-ray diffraction (XRD) spectroscopy, infrared spectroscopy (IR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) surface area analysis, and Electrochemical impedance spectra (EIS) measurements. UV/vis diffuse reflectance spectroscopy was employed to estimate band gap energies of cuprous oxide composites. The results show that the intercalation of PA into the layered GO increases the surface area of the composites and provides an efficient strategy to load Cu2O due to the large and uniform distribution of active sites for anchoring copper ions. The surface area of the Cu2O/PA/rGO (123 m2/g) nanocomposite was found to be almost 2.5 times higher than that of Cu2O/rGO (55.7 m2/g). The as-prepared Cu2O/PA/rGO show significant improvement on both adsorption capacity and photocatalytic activity towards organic pigment pollution compared with Cu2O/rGO under identical performance conditions