Ambrose Akinmusire, una nueva estrella para el firmamento del jazz

Abstract

Photodegradation is an eco-friendly degradation process routinely employed for the removal of various pollutants produced by pharmaceutical and textile industries. In this work, g-C₃N₄ sheets (g-CN) supported with Fe-doped ZrO₂ nanoparticles have been prepared via a facile hydrothermal method as photocatalysts for the effective photodegradation of methyl orange (MO) and tetracycline (TC). The as-prepared photocatalysts were characterized by using a wide range of techniques to understand the origin of their superior photodegradation performance. Structurally, Fe-doped ZrO₂ nanoparticles were found to be uniformly superficially distributed on g-C₃N₄. The addition of Fe-doped ZrO₂ nanoparticles was also found to improve the surface area and light absorption capacity of pure g-CN. It was further revealed that the development of heterojunctions between g-C₃N₄ and Fe-doped ZrO₂ nanoparticles effectively reduced the recombination rate of electron and hole pairs within the photocatalyst system, resulting in improved photocatalytic activity. Previous studies have pointed at the superoxide radical anions (˙O₂^-) and (OH·) as being primarily responsible for the degradation of MO and TC species, leading us to hypothesize that the g-FZ composite works via a possible free-radical based catalytic mechanism to support the photodegradation process.