The effect of internal stress on the photocatalytic performance of the Zn doped BiOBr photocatalyst for tetracycline degradation

• Published in: Journal of the Taiwan Institute of Chemical Engineers 2023-02, Vol.143, p.104710, Article 104710
• Main Authors: Zhang, Jiawei, Jin, Yaowei, Zhang, Yifeng, Zhang, Jing, Liu, Zezheng, Cai, Yawen, Zhang, Shuo, Fang, Ming, Kong, Mingguang, Tan, Xiaoli
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Photocatalyst; Solvent heat; Stress modulation; Tetracycline; Visible light
• ISSN: 1876-1070; 1876-1089
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jtice.2023.104710

•Zn-doped BiOBr for photocatalytic degradation of tetracycline.•The effect of stress regulation of BiOBr on photocatalysis is demonstrated.•A lateral pseudo-heterointerface was successfully constructed in Zn-BiOBr.•The photocatalytic mechanism was systematically studied. The serious environmental pollution caused by the massive deposition of antibiotics in the environment has aroused widespread concern. In this work, stress engineering is used to modulate the visible-light-driven photodegradation of tetracycline (TC) by Zn-doped BiOBr flower microspheres, which were successfully prepared by a solvothermal method. Compared with pure BiOBr, zinc-doped BiOBr significantly improved the visible light catalytic degradation efficiency of TC. When increasing the content of Zn, a local n-type zone gradually formed in the p-type BiOBr matrix to form pseudo-heterojunction with lateral heterojunction properties, and the best photocatalytic performance is 12%Zn-BiOBr. In addition, the role of active species in TC photodegradation was evaluated by adding different trapping agents. The association with internal stress and photodegradation performance was established, and the mechanism to enhance the photodegradation performance under visible light irradiation of Zn-doped BiOBr photocatalysts was proposed. [Display omitted]