Abstract
The objective of this work was to evaluate the photocatalytic activity of zinc oxide catalysts supported on natural zeolite clinoptilolite for photocatalytic degradation of the drug hydroxychloroquine, used in the treatment of malaria and which has been tested in the treatment of COVID-19. To synthesize 10%ZnOCP and 15%ZnOCP catalysts, the wet impregnation methodology was used. The raw and synthesized catalysts were characterized by XRD, SEM, XRF, BET, DRS, PCZ, FT-IR and PL. The degradation of hydroxychloroquine was calculated using UV-vis absorption from the samples before and after the photocatalytic process. The maximum percentage of degradation (96%) was obtained with the operational parameters of C0 = 10 mg L-1; Ccat = 2 g L-1 of 15%ZnOCP; pH = 7.5; UV-A radiation. Ecotoxicological tests against the bioindicators Lactuca sativa and Artemia salina confirmed the reduction of effluent toxicity after treatment.
Highlights
Water pollution is one of the biggest challenges facing humanity, especially when it comes to the retention of persistent pollutants in aquatic matrices, such as herbicides, hormones and drugs
It is of fundamental importance to study processes that can effectively remove hydroxychloroquine from water, such as heterogeneous photocatalysis, which stands out for its efficiency in degrading a range of pollutants with low biodegradation, the possibility of reusing the catalyst and low cost
It is possible to observe that the peaks present in the X-ray diffraction (XRD) of zinc oxide supported in zeolite decrease when compared to the peaks present in the zinc oxide powder, an effect which is related to the low loading of ZnO in the zeolite structure and their overlapping with the diffraction peaks of the zeolite in this region (Heidari et al 2020)
Summary
Water pollution is one of the biggest challenges facing humanity, especially when it comes to the retention of persistent pollutants in aquatic matrices, such as herbicides, hormones and drugs. The potential for environmental persistence of hydroxychloroquine has been reported in the literature, since it is a compound with high solubility and low degradation (Daughton 2014). It is of fundamental importance to study processes that can effectively remove hydroxychloroquine from water, such as heterogeneous photocatalysis, which stands out for its efficiency in degrading a range of pollutants with low biodegradation, the possibility of reusing the catalyst and low cost. The objective of this study was to fill this gap and overcome some problems associated with the heterogeneous photocatalysis process, such as the recombination of the electron-hole pair and the difficulty in recovering the catalyst after the process, because the main semiconductors used (TiO2 and ZnO) are very thin powders (Sacco et al 2018). Among the most used semiconductors, ZnO stands out as a photocatalyst due to its unique properties such as stability, high optical sensitivity, low-cost characteristics and non-toxic nature (Heidari et al 2020)
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