Enhanced photocatalytic activity on polarized ferroelectric KNbO3

In this paper, we demonstrate the enhanced photodegradation of rhodamine B on polarized ferroelectric KNbO3 (KNO) particles. High-quality KNO samples were prepared using a solid-state reaction and polarized under different electric fields. The variation of XRD and piezoelectric coefficient (d(33)) suggest an increased intensity of the ferroelectric polarization in the polarized samples. In contrast to the slow photodegradation rate of unpolarized KNO, the normalized photodegradation reaction rate constant was remarkably increased to 0.317 min(-1) by the polarized KNO. The longer photoluminescence lifetime indicates that the enhancement of photocatalytic activity in polarized ferroelectric KNO powder is mainly attributed to the enhanced internal field. We believe this work may open up new avenues in photocatalysis using polarized ferroelectric materials.