Photocatalytic Activity and Electronic Structure Analysis of N-doped Anatase TiO2: A Combined Experimental and Theoretical Study

Wastewater treatment with nanomaterials for the future: A state-of-the-art review

Aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems are both threatened by toxic wastewater. The unique properties of nanomaterials are currently being studied thoroughly for treating sewage. Nanomaterials also have the advantage of being capable of removing organic matter, fungi, and viruses from wastewater. Advanced oxidation processes are used in nanomaterials to treat wastewater. Additionally, nanomaterials have a large effective area of contact due to their tiny dimensions. The adsorption and reactivity of nanomaterials are strong. Wastewater treatment would benefit from the development of nanomaterial technology. Second, the paper provides a comprehensive analysis of the unique characteristics of nanomaterials in wastewater treatment, their proper use, and their prospects. In addition to focusing on their economic feasibility, since limited forms of nanomaterials have been manufactured, it is also necessary to consider their feasibility in terms of their technical results. According to this study, the significant adsorption area, excellent chemical reaction, and electrical conductivity of nanoparticles (NPs) contribute to the successful treatment of wastewater.

Semiconductors Application Forms and Doping Benefits to Wastewater Treatment: A Comparison of TiO2, WO3, and g-C3N4

Photocatalysis has been vastly applied for the removal of contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) and other micropollutants, with the aim of future water reclamation. As a process based upon photon irradiation, materials that may be activated through natural light sources are highly pursued, to facilitate their application and reduce costs. TiO2 is a reference material, and it has been greatly optimized. However, in its typical configuration, it is known to be mainly active under ultraviolet radiation. Thus, multiple alternative visible light driven (VLD) materials have been intensively studied recently. WO3 and g-C3N4 are currently attractive VLD catalysts, with WO3 possessing similarities with TiO2 as a metal oxide, allowing correlations between the knowledge regarding the reference catalyst, and g-C3N4 having an interesting and distinct non-metallic polymeric structure with the benefit of easy production. In this review, recent developments towards CECs degradation in TiO2 based photocatalysis are discussed, as reference catalyst, alongside the selected alternative materials, WO3 and g-C3N4. The aim here is to evaluate the different techniques more commonly explored to enhance catalyst photo-activity, specifically doping with multiple elements and the formation of composite materials. Moreover, the possible combination of photocatalysis and ozonation is also explored, as a promising route to potentialize their individual efficiencies and overcome typical drawbacks.

Theoretical investigation on un-doped and doped TiO2 for solar cell application

Enhancing solar cell efficiency is one of the most challenging and demanding topics for PV researchers. An ab initio study is done here on the structure of crystal, formation energies, electronic structure, the density of states, effective mass, and optical properties of pure and S-doped, Fe-doped, and Fe-/S-doped anatase TiO2. Co-doping causes a significant reduction in the bandgap, suppresses the charge carrier’s recombination rate, and shifted absorption spectra from UV to the visible region. Hence, co-doped anatase TiO2 with Fe and S is more favorable as a buffer layer of the solar cell compared to S-doped and Fe-doped TiO2. The forecasted values of all quantities will benefit researchers to examine these materials for further photovoltaic applications.

Energy Band Gap Modulation in Nd-Doped BiFeO3/SrRuO3 Heteroepitaxy for Visible Light Photoelectrochemical Activity

The ability of band offsets at multiferroic/metal and multiferroic/electrolyte interfaces in controlling charge transfer and thus altering the photoactivity performance has sparked significant attention in solar energy conversion applications. Here, we demonstrate that the band offsets of the two interfaces play the key role in determining charge transport direction in a downward self-polarized BFO film. Electrons tend to move to BFO/electrolyte interface for water reduction. Our experimental and first-principle calculations reveal that the presence of neodymium (Nd) dopants in BFO enhances the photoelectrochemical performance by reduction of the local electron-hole pair recombination sites and modulation of the band gap to improve the visible light absorption. This opens a promising route to the heterostructure design by modulating the band gap to promote efficient charge transfer.

Theoretical investigation of the adsorption behaviors of CO and CO2 molecules on the nitrogen-doped TiO2 anatase nanoparticles: Insights from DFT computations

Over the past years, an interest has arisen in resolving the problems of the increased carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide emissions, leading to the serious air pollution and many detrimental effects. A convenient solution would be a process that could utilize metal oxide nanoparticles such as TiO2 to control the concentration of atmospheric pollutants. The chemisorption of CO and CO2 molecules over the semiconductor titanium dioxide (TiO[Formula: see text] is such a process. In this way, density functional theory (DFT) calculations were performed to investigate CO and CO2 adsorptions on undoped and N-doped TiO2 anatase nanoparticles. The supercell approach is conducted to construct the considered nanoparticles and the adsorption of COx molecule was simulated by use of these chosen nanoparticles. By including van der Waals (vdW) interactions between COx molecule and TiO2 nanoparticle, we found that both CO and CO2 molecules can bind strongly to the N-doped nanoparticles. The adsorption on the five-fold coordinated titanium site of TiO2 nanoparticles including the bond lengths, bond angles, adsorption energies, density of states (DOSs), Mulliken population analysis and molecular orbitals has been broadly studied in this work. Based on the obtained results, it can be concluded that the adsorption on the N-doped nanoparticle is more energetically favorable than the adsorption on the pristine one, representing the higher tendency of N-doped nanoparticles for COx detention, compared to the undoped ones. Therefore, the results indicate that the N-doped TiO2 would be an ideal COx gas sensor in the environment.

Efficiency of barium removal from radioactive waste water using the combination of maghemite and titania nanoparticles in PVA and alginate beads

In this paper, both maghemite (γ-Fe2O3) and titanium oxide (TiO2) nanoparticles were synthesized and mixed in various ratios and embedded in PVA and alginate beads. Batch sorption experiments were applied for removal of barium ions from aqueous solution under sunlight using the beads. The process has been investigated as a function of pH, contact time, temperature, initial barium ion concentration and TiO2:γ-Fe2O3 ratios (1:10, 1:60 and 1). The recycling attributes of these beads were also considered. Furthermore, the results revealed that 99% of the Ba(II) was eliminated in 150min at pH 8 under sunlight. Also, the maghemite and titania PVA-alginate beads can be readily isolated from the aqueous solution after the process and reused for at least 7 times without significant losses of their initial properties. The reduction of Ba(II) with maghemite and titania PVA-alginate beads fitted the pseudo first order and second order Langmuir-Hinshelwood (L-H) kinetic model.