1+1 > 2: Highly efficient removal of organic pollutants by composite nanofibrous membrane based on the synergistic effect of adsorption and photocatalysis

Adsorption and photocatalysis are regarded as two desirable technologies for wastewater remediation, but are still unsatisfactory in removal effect, eco-friendly regeneration and facile reusability. In this study, we developed a composite nanofibrous membrane material with excellent removal performance for organic pollutants based on synergistic adsorption and photocatalysis. A novel boron-doped, nitrogen-deficient graphitic carbon nitride (B-C 3 N 4 ) photocatalyst as well as an amphiphilic copolymer of methyl methacrylate and acrylic acid (p(MMA-AA)) were synthesized respectively, and then used to modify polyethersulfone for the fabrication of composite nanofibrous membrane with improved hydrophilicity, negativelycharge property and enhanced visible light response simultaneously. Subsequently, the synergistic effect of adsorption and photocatalytic degradation for organic pollutants were identified especially and resulted in an excellent removal efficiency even superior to the combination of adsorption and photocatalytic degradation, which could be called a 1 + 1 > 2 effect. In addition, the regeneration and reusability, the purification ability for multicomponent wastewater, and the photocatalytic mechanism, were investigated and discussed systematically. In this work, we not only prepared the nanofibrous membrane with synergistic effect of adsorption and photocatalysis, but also provided a versatile approach to design dualfunctional support material to ensure the practical applications of powdery photocatalyst in wastewater treatment. (c) 2022 Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of The editorial office of Journal of Materials Science & Technology.

Automated summary

In this study, a composite nanofibrous membrane material was developed for efficient organic pollutant removal through synergistic adsorption and photocatalysis. The combination resulted in superior removal efficiency, surpassing the individual adsorption and photocatalytic degradation processes, known as a 1 + 1 > 2 effect. Further investigations were conducted on regeneration, reusability, purification ability for multicomponent wastewater, and photocatalytic mechanism.