Construction of Azobenzene Covalent Organic Frameworks as High-Performance Heterogeneous Photocatalyst

Photocatalytic performances of covalent organic frameworks (COFs) have attracted intensive attention by virtue of their regular pore structure, high specific surface area, excellent crystallinity and periodic pi bonds. Herein, COF Tp-Azo was simply synthesized from 2,4,6-triformylphloroglucinol (Tp) and 4,4'-diaminoazobenzene (Azo); and incorporation of copper salt into Tp-Azo yielded a novel COF Cu-Tp-Azo. XRD, SEM and TEM results indicated that the skeleton structure of Tp-Azo was retained in Cu-Tp-Azo. Subsequently, they were applied in the photocatalytic degradation of tetracycline, the results showed that both COFs exhibited excellent photocatalytic performance and Cu-Tp-Azo showed better degradation efficiency compared with Tp-Azo, indicating that the advantages of azo-based COFs with great potential for photocatalytic applications, and the modification of copper ions did make a difference as it can not only facilitate the separation and migration of photo-generated electron-hole pairs, but decrease their recombination, further improved the photocatalytic activity of Tp-Azo. [GRAPHICS] .

Automated summary

In this study, COF Tp-Azo and Cu-Tp-Azo were synthesized and their photocatalytic performances in the degradation of tetracycline were investigated. The results showed that Cu-Tp-Azo exhibited better degradation efficiency compared to Tp-Azo, indicating that the modification of copper ions can improve the photocatalytic activity of COFs.