Spatially thermal confinement nanoreactors for efficient photocatalytic microinterface reactions and application prospect evaluation under real weather and actual water matrices

Abstract

Photothermal photocatalysis has been a breakthrough in the photocatalysis field, yet the wasted radicals, insufficient contact of pollutant with catalyst, and low utilization efficiency of heat energy are the major barriers for practical application. In this work, a novel full-spectrum adsorption catalyst (MoS2-MoO3/C3N4) with interlayer confinement space (OMS-CNS) was fabricated as “spatially thermal confinement nanoreactor”, which can enrichment pollutants, free radicals and photothermal effect to improve the degradation efficiency of ampicillin (AMP) by 2.06 times. The synergistic of confinement effects and photothermal effects concentrated heat in the interlayer nanoreactor and simultaneously promoted the generation of •O2− and 1O2, further contributed to a more harmless degradation pathway for AMP compared with conventional photothermal photocatalytic systems. Furthermore, the enlarged interlayer spacing and high interlayer adsorption energy (Eads) enabled AMP to enter the nanoreactor for quick reaction with newly generated active radicals under locally high temperature, avoiding heat loss and the diffusion limitation of free radicals. Furthermore, the excellent degradation efficiencies of AMP were also maintained even in the actual wastewater matrices or at outdoor sunlight irradiation due to the construction of confinement space with high temperature environment and enriched ROS. The combination of the confinement catalysis and photothermal effects provides promising insight into efficient photocatalysis performance.