Unravelling the favorable photocatalytic effect of hydrogenation process on the novel g-C3N4-TiO2 catalysts for water purification

Exploring desirable and photostable homostructured catalysts is an explosive scientific hotspot for energy crisis and wastewater treatment. Efficient pollutants removal from wastewater is an attractive route to sustainable development. We here present an ideal photocatalyst that incorporates both g-C3N4 and TiO2 sheets (TNs), creating a novel nanomaterial of the type g-C3N4/TNs catalyst. The obtained photocatalyst can accelerate the interfacial charge transfer rate. Subsequently, we prepared 2:1O(-)-g-C3N4/TNs photocatalysts by H-2 treatment, which not only generated more active defects on 2:1O(-)-g-C3N4/TNs surface, but also produced oxygen vacancies. As measured by the degradation of CR (CR), the as-prepared g-C3N4/TNs samples perform outstanding removal properties due to high photocurrent response under visible light irradiation, which are transcend than bulk g-C3N4 or pure TNs separately. Specially, the obtained 2:1O(-)-g-C3N4/TNs catalysts exhibit the highest photocatalytic rate for decomposition of CR (86.7%, 2 h), which was 107.5, 7.167, and 1.43 times higher than that of TNs, g-C3N4, and 2:1 g-C3N4/TNs. The decisive factor in enhancing the photocatalytic ability of this optimal sample is the richly available reaction sites exposed by hydrogenation process.

Automated summary

The study introduced an ideal photocatalyst that combines g-C3N4 and TiO2 sheets, showing efficient pollutant removal properties in wastewater. After H-2 treatment, the photocatalyst exhibited a higher catalytic rate and more active defects.