A novel Ni doped BaTiO3/h-BN nanocomposite for visible light assisted enhanced photocatalytic degradation of textile effluent and phytotoxicity evaluation

The objective of this research is to synthesize novel Ni–BaTiO₃/h-BN nanocomposites. XRD, UV–Vis, PL, FT-IR, SEM, TEM, Zeta potential, XPS, BET, EIS, Mott- Schottky and LC-MS analyses were used to analyze the nanocomposite phase structure, band gap, electron-hole recombination rate, vibrational modes, morphology, elemental analysis stability, oxidation state, pore size distribution, and electron distribution. The nanocomposites have an average particle size of 32 nm, as measured using HR-TEM microscopy. The band gap of synthesized h-BN was found to be 3.82 eV, whereas the Ni–BaTiO₃/h-BN binary nanocomposite shifts it to 2.43 eV. The nanocomposite photocatalytic efficiency was used to degrade textile effluent, followed by a phytotoxicity assessment of real textile effluent. Furthermore, the photocatalytic treatment analysis revealed that the 40 mg Ni–BaTiO₃/h-BN catalyst degraded up to 81.4% and 86% against textile effluent and crystal violet (CV) dye within 120 min under visible light, respectively, and the concentrations of numerous Physico-chemical parameters of textile effluent have significantly decreased in deteriorated textile effluent. According to a pot study, the toxicity of the degraded textile effluent was reduced following photocatalytic treatment. To examine the mechanism, the photodegradation effectiveness of the catalyst was investigated utilizing various scavengers. From the scavenger study, it is found that the holes (h⁺) contribute more to the degradation process. In real textile dye wastewater, the Ni–BaTiO₃/h-BN nanocatalyst was proved to be an excellent and low-cost degrading technique.