Snow-like BiVO4 with rich oxygen defects for efficient visible light photocatalytic degradation of ciprofloxacin

Zhanghao Chen; Na Mi; Liuqing Huang; Wenran Wang; Chen Li; Ying Teng; Cheng Gu

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.152083

Snow-like BiVO₄ with rich oxygen defects for efficient visible light photocatalytic degradation of ciprofloxacin

Sci Total Environ. 2022 Feb 20:808:152083. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.152083. Epub 2021 Nov 29.

Authors

Zhanghao Chen¹, Na Mi², Liuqing Huang¹, Wenran Wang¹, Chen Li¹, Ying Teng¹, Cheng Gu³

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of Pollution Control and Resource Reuse, School of the Environment, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023, PR China.
² State Key Laboratory of Pollution Control and Resource Reuse, School of the Environment, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023, PR China; State Environmental Protection Key Laboratory of Soil Environmental Management and Pollution Control, Nanjing Institute of Environmental Sciences, Ministry of Ecology and Environment, Nanjing 210042, PR China.
³ State Key Laboratory of Pollution Control and Resource Reuse, School of the Environment, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023, PR China. Electronic address: chenggu@nju.edu.cn.

PMID: 34856276
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.152083

Abstract

The overuse of ciprofloxacin (CIP), causing serious environment pollution, has drawn great attentions. To provide alternative solution to this problem, we synthesized a snow-like BiVO₄ with rich oxygen vacancy by adjusting the amounts of cetyltrimethyl ammonia bromide (CTAB) surfactant. Various characterizations were performed to investigate the morphology and surface properties of the synthesized BiVO₄. Interestingly, both the morphology and the amount of oxygen vacancy were related to the concentration of additional CTAB, and the most oxygen vacancies were generated when specific amount of CTAB (molar ratio of CTAB to Bi³⁺ of 0.2) was introduced. Photoluminescence and photoelectrochemical tests demonstrated that the presence of oxygen vacancy significantly enhanced the separation efficiency of photo-generated carriers in BiVO₄. Subsequently, CIP photodegradation was significantly enhanced in the presence of snow-like BiVO₄. Both quenching experiments and EPR tests demonstrated that photogenerated holes and •O₂^- were the main active species contributing to CIP degradation. Furthermore, CIP transformation pathway was proposed based on the identified transformation products. Our study developed a novel method to synthesize a BiVO₄ material with snow-like morphology and abundant oxygen vacancy by simply varying the amount of surfactant. This study would shed light on designing the next generation photocatalyst with the assistant of surfactant to control the surface properties.

Keywords: BiVO(4); Ciprofloxacin; Photocatalyst; Snow-like morphology; Surface oxygen vacancy.

MeSH terms

Bismuth*
Catalysis
Ciprofloxacin*
Light
Oxygen

Substances

Ciprofloxacin
Oxygen
Bismuth