Degradation of dyes is a standard method for checking the photocatalytic activity of any type of photocatalyst In this paper, one-dimensional (1-D) poly-vinyl butyral (PVB)/cadmium sulfide (CdS) nanofibers have been first prepared by using cadmium nitrate and thiourea dissolved in a solvent of ethanol and the polymer used polyvinyl butyral via electrospinning approach. The as-spun 1-D PVB/CdS nanofibers were employed as precursors to fabricate cotton- and fiber-shaped PVB/CdS composite materials via annealing treatment and microwave irradiation. The structure, morphology, composition, and optical properties of the samples were characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The photocatalytic activity of two kinds of resultant PVB/CdS composite materials under visible light irradiation was evaluated by degrading methylene orange (MO). (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.