Automated Construction of a Photocatalysis Dataset for Water-Splitting Applications

We present an automatically generated dataset of 15,755 records that were extracted from 47,357 papers. These records contain water-splitting activity in the presence of certain photocatalysts, along with additional information about the chemical reaction conditions under which this activity was recorded. These conditions include any co-catalysts and additives that were present during water splitting, the length of time for which the photocatalytic experiment was conducted, and the type of light source used, including its wavelength. Despite the text extraction of such a wide range of chemical reaction attributes, the dataset afforded good precision (71.2%) and recall (36.3%). These figures-of-merit were calculated based on a random sample of open-access papers from the corpus. Mining such a complex set of attributes required the development of novel techniques in knowledge extraction and interdependency resolution, leveraging inter- and intra-sentence relations, which are also described in this paper. We present a new version (version 2.2) of the chemistry-aware text-mining toolkit ChemDataExtractor, in which these new techniques are included.

Solar-driven hybrid photo-Fenton degradation of persistent antibiotic ciprofloxacin by zinc ferrite-titania heterostructures: degradation pathway, intermediates, and toxicity analysis

Present work puts forward an efficient strategy to degrade one of the persistent antibiotic contaminants, ciprofloxacin (CIP). Hybrid advanced oxidation process (HAOP) is tailored with a synergy effect between photocatalysis and photo-Fenton catalysis on zinc ferrite-titania heterostructured composite (ZFO-TiO₂). The ZFO-TiO₂ heterostructured composite enables heterogenous surfaces for enhanced charge separation where HAOP is implemented for CIP degradation with the aid of class AAA solar simulator. The results reveal an enhanced degradation rate of CIP (k_obs = 0.255 min^-1), noticeably higher than the conventional TiO₂-based photocatalysis. The HAOP system strongly enhances the reaction rates showing five times higher performance as compared to TiO₂-based photocatalysis. The substitution reactions for degradation of CIP into its intermediates were analyzed by LC-MS/MS, and the plausible degradation pathways have been graphically modeled identifying 3-phenyl-1-propanol and phenol molecules as less toxic end products. Toxicity of the photodegraded samples reveal 18.1 ± 1.24% inhibition of V. fischeri at the end of 60-min treatment indicating reduced toxicity of CIP contaminated samples. Antimicrobial inhibition studies on E. coli also corroborate an effective CIP removal (~ 100%) in less than 90 min. The study puts forward a novel ZFO-TiO₂ composite HAOP system for efficient and rapid mineralization of an antibiotic pollutant, extendable towards wide range of pharmaceutical drug degradation studies.

Different Fuel-Adopted Combustion Syntheses of Nano-Structured NiCrFeO4: A Highly Recyclable and Versatile Catalyst for Reduction of Nitroarenes at Room Temperature and Photocatalytic Degradation of Various Organic Dyes in Unitary and Ternary Solutions

As industrialization progresses, there is a large release of hazardous pollutants into the environment. These pollutants, which contain nitro compounds and organic dyes, are extremely dangerous due to their toxic and carcinogenic nature. An efficient, environmentally benign, and economical catalyst to degrade environmental pollutants or convert them into useful products has been of sustained interest in recent years. In this context, we report a simple and inexpensive combustion fabrication of NiCrFeO₄ using different fuels such as glycine, polyvinyl alcohol (PVA), and urea, showing tremendous catalytic and photocatalytic functionalities. Rietveld refinement and X-ray diffraction studies confirmed the formation of single-phase ferrites, with crystallite sizes ranging from 3.9 to 43.31 nm. The values of optical band gap, obtained from the diffused reflectance spectroscopy technique, lie in the visible region range (1.50-1.60 eV), and hence, all the synthesized ferrites can act as good photocatalysts in the presence of visible light. All the NCF nanocatalysts were utilized for the reduction of nitroarenes and photocatalytic degradation of various cationic (RhB and MB) and anionic (MO) dyes and their mixture. NCFP displayed excellent activity for the reduction and oxidation reactions owing to its large surface area and low optical band gap. Furthermore, the photo-oxidative degradation by NCFP was also enhanced due to its low recombination of charge carriers as confirmed by the photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy. NCFP efficiently reduces nitrobenzene to aminobenzene with 95% yield using sodium borohydride as the reducing agent in methanol medium at RT in 10 min. The results of photocatalytic activity have shown that the degradation efficiency of NCFP follows the order RhB > MB > MO in their unitary solution. Furthermore, in the case of the mixture of dyes, NCFP showed enhanced photocatalytic degradation for cationic dyes (RhB and MB) compared to that of anionic dye (MO). From the performance point of view, this catalyst can be useful in industrial application because of its high stability, greater catalytic efficiency, and cost-effectiveness.

Effect of cation configuration and solvation on the band positions of zinc ferrite (100)

Zinc ferrite ZnFe[Formula: see text]O[Formula: see text] belongs to the spinel-type ferrites that have been proposed as photocatalysts for water splitting. The electronic band gap and the band edge positions are of utmost importance for the efficiency of the photocatalytic processes. We, therefore, calculated the absolute band energies of the most stable surface of ZnFe[Formula: see text]O[Formula: see text], the Zn-terminated (100) surface at self-consistent hybrid density functional theory level. The effect of Fe- and Zn-rich environments, cation exchange as antisite defects and implicit solvation on the band positions is investigated. Calculated flat band potentials of the pristine surface model ranges from [Formula: see text] to [Formula: see text] V against SHE in vacuum. For Zn-rich (Fe-rich) models this changes 0.3-0.9 (0.0-0.7) V against SHE. Fe-rich models are closest to the experimental range of reported flat band potentials. Solvent effects lower the calculated flat band potentials by up to 1.8 eV. The calculated band gaps range from 1.5 to 2.9 eV in agreement with previous theoretical work and experiment. Overall, our calculations confirm the experimentally observed low activity of ZnFe[Formula: see text]O[Formula: see text] and its dependence on preparation conditions.

Ultrasensitive electrode-free and co-catalyst-free detection of nanomoles per hour hydrogen evolution for the discovery of new photocatalysts

High throughput theoretical methods are increasingly used to identify promising photocatalytic materials for hydrogen generation from water as a clean source of energy. While most promising water splitting candidates require co-catalyst loading and electrical biasing, computational costs to predict them a priori become large. It is, therefore, important to identify bare, bias-free semiconductor photocatalysts with small initial hydrogen production rates, often in the range of tens of nanomoles per hour, as these can become highly efficient with further co-catalyst loading and biasing. Here, we report a sensitive hydrogen detection system suitable for screening new photocatalysts. The hydrogen evolution rate of the prototypical rutile TiO₂ loaded with 0.3 wt. % Pt is detected to be 78.0 ± 0.8 µmol/h/0.04 g, comparable with the rates reported in the literature. In contrast, sensitivity to an ultralow evolution rate of 11.4 ± 0.3 nmol/h/0.04 g is demonstrated for bare polycrystalline TiO₂ without electrical bias. Two candidate photocatalysts, ZnFe₂O₄ (18.1 ± 0.2 nmol/h/0.04 g) and Ca₂PbO₄ (35.6 ± 0.5 nmol/h/0.04 g) without electrical bias or co-catalyst loading, are demonstrated to be potentially superior to bare TiO₂. This work expands the techniques available for sensitive detection of photocatalytic processes toward much faster screening of new candidate photocatalytic materials in their bare state.

Titanium carbide/zeolite imidazole framework-8/polylactic acid electrospun membrane for near-infrared regulated photothermal/photodynamic therapy of drug-resistant bacterial infections

Bacteria induced wound infection has become fatal healthcare issues needed to be resolved urgently. It is of vital importance to develop multifunctional therapeutic platforms to fight against increased bacterial antibiotic resistance. Herein, a titanium carbide (MXene)/zeolite imidazole framework-8 (ZIF-8)/polylactic acid (PLA) composite membrane (MZ-8/PLA) was fabricated through in-situ growth of ZIF-8 on MXene and the subsequent electrospinning process. It indicated MZ-8 can generate singlet oxygen and hyperthermia at photothermal (PTT) convention efficiency of 80.5% with bactericidal rate of more than 99.0%. In addition, MZ-8 showed remarkable antitumor efficiency in vitro and in vivo based on the combined photodynamic/photothermal therapy. Theoretical calculation illustrated MZ-8 could improve the laser activation process by acceleration of intermolecular charge transfer, reducing excitation energy, stabilizing excited states and increasing intersystem crossing rate. After incorporated into electrospun scaffolds, MZ-8/PLA exhibited potent PTT and photodynamic therapy (PDT) properties under 808 nm laser irradiation. The antibacterial rates of MZ-8/PLA were up to 99.9% and 99.8% against Escherichia coli and Methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus, respectively. In-vivo experimental results further confirmed that MZ-8/PLA can accelerate bacteria infected wound healing without observable resistance. This work opens a new avenue to design promising platforms for fighting against extremely drug resistant bacterial infection.

GW-BSE Calculations of Electronic Band Gap and Optical Spectrum of ZnFe2 O4 : Effect of Cation Distribution and Spin Configuration

The G0W0, evGW0, evGW, and scGW0 approximations to many‐body perturbation theory combined with the Bethe‐Salpeter approach (BSE) are applied to calculate electronic and optical properties of the open‐shell spinel ferrite ZnFe₂O₄. The effect of the various degrees of self‐consistency is assessed by comparison to recent experimental results. Furthermore, the influence of the method for obtaining the ground‐state wavefunction is studied, including the GGA functional PBE with and without an intermediate step using the COHSEX approximation, as well as PBE+U, where we try to minimize the influence of the Hubbard potential U. Best agreement for the optical band gap and the first maxima of the excitation spectrum is obtained with the evGW method based on a PBE+U wavefunction. This method is chosen and converged carefully to yield quantitative results for the optical spectra of four different magnetic structures and cation distributions of ZnFe₂O₄. With the results we provide a possible explanation for inconsistency in experimental results.

Facile Synthesis of Sandwich-Like rGO/CuS/Polypyrrole Nanoarchitectures for Efficient Electromagnetic Absorption

Currently, electromagnetic pollution management has gained much attention due to the various harmful effects on wildlife and human beings. Electromagnetic absorbers can convert energy from electromagnetic waves into thermal energy. Previous reports have demonstrated that reduced graphene oxide (rGO) makes progress in the electromagnetic absorption (EA) field. But the high value of permittivity of rGO always mismatches the impedance which results in more electromagnetic wave reflection on the surface. In this work, sandwich-like rGO/CuS/polypyrrole (PPy) nanoarchitectures have been synthesized by a facile two-step method. The experimental result has shown that a paraffin composite containing 10 wt.% of rGO/CuS/PPy could achieve an enhanced EA performance both in bandwidth and intensity. The minimum reflection loss (RL) value of −49.11 dB can be reached. Furthermore, the effective bandwidth can cover 4.88 GHz. The result shows that the as-prepared rGO/CuS/PPy nanoarchitectures will be a promising EA material.

Photoelectrochemistry of Ferrites: Theoretical Predictions vs. Experimental Results

This paper gives an overview about recent theoretical and experimental work on electronic and optical properties of spinel ferrites MFe2O4. These compounds have come into focus of research due to their possible application as photocatalyst material for photoelectrochemical water splitting. The theoretical background of state-of-the-art quantum-chemical approaches applied for predicting electronic and optical band gaps, absolute band positions, optical absorption spectra, dielectric functions and Raman spectra, is briefly reviewed. Recent applications of first-principles methods on magnetic and electronic properties of ferrites with M = Mg and the first row of subgroup elements Sc to Zn are presented, where it is shown that the fundamental band gap is strongly dependent on the spin state and the degree of inversion of the spinel structure. The observed variation of electronic properties may serve as an explanation for the large scattering of experimental results. The exchange of M and Fe cations has also a pronounced effect on the Raman spectra of ferrites, which is analyzed at atomic scale from first principles. Calculated optical absorption spectra of ferrites are compared to experimental spectra. The electronic nature of the first excitations and the role of oxygen vacancies are discussed. For the calculation of absolute band positions, which have a significant impact on the photoelectrochemical activity of the ferrites, models of the most stable ferrite surfaces are developed that take into account their polar nature and the interaction with the solvent. Theoretically predicted valence and conduction band edges are compared to results from electrochemical measurements. The role of cation exchange on the surface electronic structure is investigated both theoretically and experimentally.

Photocatalytic Simultaneous Removal of Nitrite and Ammonia via a Zinc Ferrite/Activated Carbon Hybrid Catalyst under UV-Visible Irradiation

Nitrite and ammonia often coexist in waters. Thus, it is very significant to develop a photocatalytic process for the simultaneous removal of nitrite and ammonia. Herein, zinc ferrite/activated carbon (ZnFe₂O₄/AC) was synthesized and characterized by X-ray diffraction spectroscopy, transmission electron microscopy, Raman spectroscopy, and ultraviolet-visible diffuse reflectance spectroscopy. The valence band level of ZnFe₂O₄ was measured by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy-valence band spectroscopy, and first-principles calculation was performed to confirm the band structure of ZnFe₂O₄. The as-synthesized ZnFe₂O₄/AC species functioned as a photocatalyst to simultaneously remove nitrite and ammonia under anaerobic conditions upon UV-visible light irradiation at the first stage. The results indicated that an average removal ratio of 92.7% with ±0.2% error for nitrite degradation for three runs was achieved in 50.0 mg/L nitrite + 100.0 mg/L ammonia solution with pH 9.5 under anaerobic conditions for 3 h at this stage; simultaneously, the removal ratio of 64.0% with ±0.2% error for ammonia was also achieved. At the second stage, oxygen gas was bubbled in the reactor to photocatalytically eliminate residual ammonia under aerobic conditions upon continuous irradiation. The results demonstrated that the removal ratios for nitrite, ammonia, and total nitrogen reached to 92.0, 90.0, and 90.2% at 12th hour, respectively, and the product released during photocatalysis is N₂ gas, detected by gas chromatography, fulfilling the simultaneous removal of nitrite and ammonia. The reaction mechanism was exploited.

Influence of Spin State and Cation Distribution on Stability and Electronic Properties of Ternary Transition-Metal Oxides

This work is a systematic ab initio study of the influence of spin state and cation distribution on the stability, dielectric constant, electronic band gap, and density of states of ternary transition-metal oxides. As an example, the chemical family of spinel ferrites MFe₂O₄, with M = Mg, Sc-Zn is chosen. Dielectric constant and band gap are calculated for various spin states and cation configurations via dielectric-dependent self-consistent hybrid functionals and compared to available experimental data. When choosing the most stable spin state and cation configuration, the calculated electronic properties are in reasonable agreement with measured values. The nature of the excitation is investigated through projected density of states. A pronounced dependence of band gap energy and dielectric constant on the spin state and cation configuration is observed, which is a possible explanation for the large variation of the experimental results, in particular, if several states are energetically close.

Facile synthesis of yolk–shell structured ZnFe2O4 microspheres for enhanced electrocatalytic oxygen evolution reaction

Yolk–shell structured ZnFe₂O₄ microspheres with excellent OER performance are synthesized via a facile solvothermal method and annealing treatment.

Controllable Fabrication of Fe₃O₄/ZnO Core⁻Shell Nanocomposites and Their Electromagnetic Wave Absorption Performance in the 2⁻18 GHz Frequency Range

In this study, Fe₃O₄/ZnO core⁻shell nanocomposites were synthesized through a chemical method of coating the magnetic core (Fe₃O₄) with ZnO by co-precipitation of Fe₃O₄ with zinc acetate in a basic medium of ammonium hydroxide. The phase structure, morphology and electromagnetic parameters of the Fe₃O₄/ZnO core⁻shell nanocomposites were investigated. The results indicated that the concentration of the solvent was responsible for controlling the morphology of the composites, which further influenced their impedance matching and microwave absorption properties. Moreover, Fe₃O₄/ZnO nanocomposites exhibited an enhanced absorption capacity in comparison with the naked Fe₃O₄ nanospheres. Specifically, the minimum reflection loss value reached −50.79 dB at 4.38 GHz when the thickness was 4.5 mm. It is expected that the Fe₃O₄/ZnO core⁻shell structured nanocomposites could be a promising candidate as high-performance microwave absorbers.

Facile synthesis of ZnFe2O4 photocatalysts for decolourization of organic dyes under solar irradiation

ZnFe₂O₄ was fabricated by a simple solution-combustion method. The structural, optical and electronic properties are investigated by XRD, TEM, FESEM, UV-vis DRS, PL, FTIR and photocurrent measurements. The photocatalytic activity of the prepared material is studied with regard to the degradation of rhodamine B (Rh B) and Congo red under solar irradiation. The kinetic study showed that the material exhibits zeroth and first order reaction kinetics for the degradation of Rh B and Congo red, respectively. The photocatalytic behaviour of ZnFe₂O₄ was systematically studied as a function of the activation temperature. ZnFe₂O₄ prepared at 500 °C showed the highest activity in degrading Rh B and Congo red. The highest activity of ZnFe₂O₄-500 °C correlates well with the lowest PL intensity, highest photocurrent and lowest particle size.

“Two channel” photocatalytic hydrogen peroxide production using g-C3N4 coated CuO nanorod heterojunction catalysts prepared via a novel molten salt-assisted microwave process

This work reports g-C₃N₄ coated CuO nanorod catalysts with outstanding photocatalytic H₂O₂ production ability via a “two channel pathway”.

Smart photocatalytic removal of ammonia through molecular recognition of zinc ferrite/reduced graphene oxide hybrid catalyst under visible-light irradiation

The ZnFe₂O₄/rGO catalysts recognizes NH₃from RHB and degrades it to N₂under visible light irradiation.

Self-Assembled Heteroepitaxial Oxide Nanocomposite for Photoelectrochemical Solar Water Oxidation

We report on spontaneously phase ordered heteroepitaxial SrTiO₃ (STO):ZnFe₂O₄ (ZFO) nanocomposite films that give rise to strongly enhanced photoelectrochemical solar water oxidation, consistent with enhanced photoinduced charge separation. The STO:ZFO nanocomposite yielded an enhanced photocurrent density of 0.188 mA/cm² at 1.23 V vs a reversible hydrogen electrode, which was 7.9- and 2.6-fold higher than that of the plain STO film and ZFO film cases under 1-sun illumination, respectively. The photoelectrode also produced stable photocurrent and Faradaic efficiencies of H₂ and O₂ formation that were more than 90%. Incident-photon-to-current-conversion efficiency measurements, Tauc plots, Mott-Schottky plots, and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy measurements proved that the strongly enhanced photogenerated charge separation resulted from vertically aligned pseudosingle crystalline components, epitaxial heterojunctions, and a staggered band alignment of the components of the nanocomposite films. This study presents a completely new avenue for efficient solar energy conversion applications.

Improving Stability and Photoelectrochemical Performance of BiVO4 Photoanodes in Basic Media by Adding a ZnFe2O4 Layer

BiVO4 photoanodes have mainly been investigated under neutral conditions because BiVO4 gradually dissolves under extreme pH conditions. In this study, the possibility of utilizing ZnFe2O4 as a protection layer to stabilize BiVO4 in a 0.1 M KOH solution was investigated. A 10-15 nm thick ZnFe2O4 layer was conformally placed on a nanoporous BiVO4 electrode by photodepositing a FeOOH layer, followed by drop casting a zinc nitrate solution and annealing. The resulting BiVO4/ZnFe2O4 electrode generated a photocurrent density of >2 mA/cm(2) at 1.23 V versus RHE with a significantly improved stability compared with the pristine BiVO4 electrode. The incident and absorbed photon-to-current conversion efficiencies along with absorption spectra suggested that the ZnFe2O4 protection layer also contributes to photocurrent generation by increasing photon absorption and electron-hole separation. These results suggest that further investigation of protection and catalyst layers can enable more stable and efficient operation of BiVO4-based photoanodes in basic media.

Augmenting the catalytic activity of CoFe2O4 by substituting rare earth cations into the spinel structure

The current research work evaluates significant enhancement in photo-Fenton activity of pristine cobalt ferrite (CoFe₂O₄) by inserting very small quantity of rare earth cations such as cerium (Ce³⁺) and lanthanum (La³⁺) into its spinel structure.

Defective ZnFe₂O₄ nanorods with oxygen vacancy for photoelectrochemical water splitting

A one-dimensional zinc ferrite (ZnFe2O4) nanorod photoanode was prepared by a simple solution method on the F-doped tin oxide glass substrate. Thermal treatment under a hydrogen or vacuum atmosphere improved the photoelectrochemical water oxidation activity up to 20 times. The various physical characterization techniques used revealed that oxygen vacancies were created by the treatments in the near surface region, which increased the donor density and passivated the surface states. Hydrogen treatment was more effective and it was important to find optimum treatment conditions to take advantage of the positive role of oxygen vacancy as a source of electron donors and avoid its negative effect as electron trap sites.

Double-Shell Architectures of ZnFe2O4 Nanosheets on ZnO Hollow Spheres for High-Performance Gas Sensors

In this study, double-shell composites consisting of inner ZnO hollow microspheres (ZHS) surrounded by outer ZnFe2O4 nanosheets were successfully synthesized. The growth of the ultrathin ZnFe2O4 nanosheets (∼10 nm) on the ZHS outer surface was carried out at room temperature via solution reactions in order to generate a double-shell configuration that could provide a large surface area. As a proof-of-concept demonstration of the design, a comparative sensing investigation between the sensors based on the as-obtained ZnO/ZnFe2O4 composites and its two individual components (ZnO hollow spheres and ZnFe2O4 nanosheets) was performed. As expected, the response of the ZnFe2O4-decorated ZnO composites to 100 ppm acetone was about 3 times higher than that of initial ZnO microspheres. Moreover, a dramatic reduction of response/recover time has been achieved at different operating temperature. Such favorable sensing performances endow these ZnO/ZnFe2O4 heterostructures with a potential application in gas sensing.

The role of surface Zn2+ ions in the transesterification of vegetable oils over ZnO supported on Al2O3 and Fe2O3

ZnO–Al₂O₃ and ZnO–Fe₂O₃ with different loadings of ZnO (5–20 wt%) along with ZnAl₂O₄ and ZnFe₂O₄ were prepared and tested in the transesterification of sunflower, waste cooking oil and Jatropha oil.

Novel synthesis of C, N doped rice grain shaped ZnS nanomaterials – towards enhanced visible light photocatalytic activity for aqueous pollutant removal and H2 production

Novel synthesis of C, N doped rice grain shaped visible active ZnS nano photocatalysts. Enhanced activity for the pollutant removal and H₂ production from water.