Preparation and photocatalytic property of porous CuO hollow microspheres via carbon sphere templates

Porous copper oxide (CuO) hollow microspheres have been successfully fabricated by using carbon spheres as templates. The products were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffractometry (XRD) and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). The influences of different experimental parameters on the morphology of CuO structures have been investigated in detail and the possible formation mechanism of porous CuO hollow microspheres has also been proposed. The specific surface area of the hollow spheres with 74.805 m2/g is measured by BET method. Barrett-Joyner-Halenda (BJH) calculations for the pore size distribution, derived from desorption data, reveal that the average pore radius is 8.56 nm, and the total pore volume (r = 1686.1 A, P/P0 = 0.994296) is 0.107257 cc/g. UV-vis absorption spectrum shows quantum size effect of porous CuO hollow microspheres. Furthermore, the porous CuO hollow microspheres exhibit high efficiency for photodegradation of a sample organic dye, Rhodamine B (RhB), under UV light.