O3-assisted low-temperature preparation of marginal S and graphitic N co-doped graphene oxide as high-performance electrocatalyst for bisphenol A degradation

Abstract

In this research, a novel insight was provided for oriented low-temperature S and N doping into graphene oxide (GO).Given the gradual concern in the high-temperature dependence of traditional annealing method for the oriented design of heteroatom doping, utilizing O3 etching-assisted heteroatom doping can simultaneously resolve the problems of energy consumption and doping species design. In this research, with O3 etching, 100 at.% marginal S (C-SOX-C) and 92 at.% graphitic N co-doped O3-S/NGO were successfully synthesized at annealing temperature of 200 °C. Characterization results showed that S and N doping via O3 etching maintained the sheet-like structure of GO without much stacking (layer thickness of 4–5 nm). In addition, active defects were formed by O3 etching and S/N atom doping to provide active center for catalytic reaction. The electrocatalytic degradation behavior proved that 100 % bisphenol A degradation efficiency could be achieved by O3-S/NGO within 30 min and that the main active species generated during the reaction were O2•−, 1O2 and active chlorine. The possible pathways of bisphenol A degradation were also determined to complete the discussion. This project was based on the environmental demand of organic pollution control and suggested an optimal preparation strategy for high-performance catalyst preparation and utilization.