Effects of different preparing conditions and annealing on the photocatalytic activity of hydrothermal grown BiVO4

BiVO4 was hydrothermally synthesized under different preparing conditions and characterized by XRD, SEM, Raman spectrum and BET specific surface area. The influence of different pH value and annealing temperature and hydrothermal time on the morphologies and structures of the BiVO4 samples was investigated systematically. It can be found that annealing would eliminate the effects caused by the pH of precursor, heating temperature and heating time, but preparing conditions still influenced the size and specific surface area of samples. Furthermore, the photocatalytic activities of the fabricated BiVO4 were also evaluated by the degradation of methyl blue in aqueous solution under UV and visible light irradiation.