Evaluation of practical application potential of a photocatalyst: Ultimate apparent photocatalytic activity.

Suffered from rapid recombination of electrons and holes, apparent photocatalytic activity (APA) of all photocatalysts can never achieve their theoretical ultimate values. But the upper limit of practical APA is of great significance to evaluate the practical application potential of a photocatalyst. Thus, in this work, the concept of ultimate apparent photocatalytic activity (UAPA) was firstly proposed and a convenient evaluation method was first established based on the nature that EDTA-2Na can exclusively scavenge photo-excited holes, and methyl orange (MO) is mainly attacked by superoxide radical (O) which is produced instantly by photo-excited electrons.

Facile synthesis of highly crystalline g-CN nanosheets with remarkable visible light photocatalytic activity for antibiotics removal.

g-CN has attracted much attention in photocatalysis field because of its good visible light response. However, its photocatalytic activity is still greatly limited by fast carriers recombination and small specific surface. In order to promote carriers separation and pollutants adsorption, a facile synthesis scheme combining hydrothermal method with secondary calcination process under N gas protection was developed, and highly crystalline g-CN nanosheets (HCCNNS) were successfully prepared.

Effective blockage of chloride ion quenching and chlorinated by-product generation in photocatalytic wastewater treatment.

Photocatalytic degradation of pollutants in high salinity wastewater usually shows extremely low activities and produces highly toxic by-products, often related to the presence of excess chloride ion (Cl). Herein, we report for the first time that involvement of Cl (quenching active species and generating chlorinated by-products) could be effectively blocked during photocatalytic processes. Based on a comprehensive investigation of its mechanism, we found that Cl could quench superoxide radicals (O) through a cyclic indirect quenching model with holes (h) and hydroxyl radicals (OH) quenching as "initiators".

Molecularly imprinted carbon nanosheets supported TiO: Strong selectivity and synergic adsorption-photocatalysis for antibiotics removal.

In order to achieve strong specific recognition and remarkable synergy between adsorption and photocatalysis, carbon nanosheets supported TiO (CT) was designed and embellished by molecular imprinting technology with ciprofloxacin (CIP) as template. The molecular imprinted CT (CT-MI) product exhibited remarkable synergy of adsorption-photocatalysis and high selectivity in both aspects, benefitted from specific recognition of imprinted layer, strong carbon adsorption and electroconductivity, and enhanced photocatalysis. Compared to the competitive pollutant, sulfamethoxazole (SMZ) in this study, selectivity coefficient was 7.