Abstract
The construction of heterojunctions between semiconductors is a preferred route to improve overall photocatalytic activity. In this work, a facile and feasible method was innovatively developed to one-step prepare g-C3N4/TiO2 heterojunctions via an absorption-calcination process using nitrogen and titanium precursors directly. This method can effectively avoid interfacial defects and establish a tight interfacial connection between g-C3N4 and TiO2. The resultant g-C3N4/TiO2 composites exhibited prominent photodegradation efficiency for tetracycline hydrochloride (TC-HCl) under visible light and simulated-sunlight irradiation. The optimal g-C3N4/TiO2 composite (urea content of 4 g) showed the highest photocatalytic efficiency, which can degrade 90.1% TC-HCl under simulated-sunlight irradiation within 30 min, achieving 3.9 and 2 times increases compared to pure g-C3N4 and TiO2, respectively. Besides, photodegradation pathways based on the role of active species ·O2− and ·OH were identified, indicating that a direct Z-scheme heterojunction was formed over the g-C3N4/TiO2 photocatalyst. The enhanced photocatalytic performance can be attributed to the close-knit interface contact and the formation of Z-scheme heterojunction between g-C3N4 and TiO2, which can accelerate the photo-induced charge carrier separation, broaden the spectra absorption range, and retain a higher redox potential. This one-step synthesis method may provide a new strategy for the construction of Z-scheme heterojunction photocatalysts consisting of g-C3N4 and TiO2 for environmental remediation and solar energy utilization.
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Acknowledgements
Thanks are due to Dr. Yangfan Lu (School of Materials Science and Engineering) for her help on XPS measurement and analysis.
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The generous support of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (51872258) and the Innovation Fund of the Zhejiang Kechuang New Materials Research Institute (ZKN-20-Z03) is gratefully acknowledged.
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection, and analysis were performed by Renke Bi, Zhe Liu, Jialong Liu, Yijie Shen, and Chutong Zhou. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Renke Bi and Zhiyu Wang. All authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Bi, R., Liu, J., Zhou, C. et al. In situ synthesis of g-C3N4/TiO2 heterojunction by a concentrated absorption process for efficient photocatalytic degradation of tetracycline hydrochloride. Environ Sci Pollut Res 30, 55044–55056 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-023-26265-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-023-26265-1