Improved photocatalytic and sterilization performance of Cu doped sea urchin-like WO3−x

Abstract

At present, water resources contaminated by pathogenic microorganisms have an increasingly serious impact on human health. Photocatalytic sterilization using solar energy is an inexpensive and effective method. However, how to effectively utilize solar energy and improve the photocatalytic performance of catalysts is the main problem at present. In this work, urchin-like WO_3−x and Cu-doped WO_3−x were synthesized by a simple method. The synthesized photocatalysts were characterized in detail, and the sterilization performance of the catalysts was investigated under simulated sunlight. The sterilization rates of WO_3−x against Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus were 65.74% and 94.73%, respectively, while the sterilization rates of WO_3−x doped with Cu against these two bacteria were 99.95% and 99.24%, respectively. Cu–WO_3−x shows excellent photocatalytic bactericidal performance, which is attributed to the enhanced oxygen vacancies of WO_3−x and the separation of photogenerated electron–hole pairs by the doping of Cu. This work is expected to provide an effective way to develop solar photocatalytic sterilization.