Kexin Wang, Changlu Shao*, Xinghua Li*, Fujun Miao, Na Lu Andyichun Liu

Room temperature immobilized BiOI nanosheets on flexible electrospun polyacrylonitrile nanofibers with high visible-light photocatalytic activity

Kexin Wang, Changlu Shao*, Xinghua Li*, Fujun Miao, Na Lu andYichun Liu

Center for Advanced Optoelectronic Functional Materials Research, and Key Laboratory of UV-Emitting Materials and Technology (Northeast Normal University), Ministry of Education, 5268 Renmin Street, Changchun 130024, People’s Republic of China.

*Corresponding author:

Center for Advanced Optoelectronic Functional Materials Research, and Key Laboratory of UV-Emitting Materials and Technology (Northeast Normal University), Ministry of Education, 5268 Renmin Street, Changchun 130024,P. R. China.

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Photocatalysts (0.1 g) were placed in 100 mL degradation solution: β-phenol (150 mg/L solvent, acetonitrile: water = 1:99 v/v). At given intervals of illumination, 4 mL reacted solutions in series were taken out and analyzed to determine β-phenol concentration by a UH4150 spectrophotometer at 327 nm. For photcatalysis process, there was an adsorption–desorption equilibrium process in dark for 1 h. Then the β-phenol solutions added with the same weight of different BiOI/PAN NFs samples were then subjected to visible-light irradiation. The photocatalytic activity of PAN, BiOI/PAN-C10, BiOI/PAN-C20 and BiOI/PAN-C30 are illustrated in Figure S1. It can be clearly seen that the PAN nanofibers present none photocatalytic activity. Compared with pure PAN nanofibers, the BiOI/PAN-C10, BiOI/PAN-C20 and BiOI/PAN-C30 show good photocatalytic activity with high photodegradation efficiencies of about 28%, 51% and 74% after 4 h, respectively. The highest photocatalytic degradation efficiency is also observed for BiOI/PAN-C30 as compared with the other samples.

As shown in Fig. S2 (a), the degradationof rhodamine B (RhB) is about 89% after 4h visible-lightirradiation for BiOI/PAN-C30, while ~ 57% degradation of RhB is observedfor the nanosturctured BiOI (22 mg, based on TG analysis of BiOI/PAN-C30). Similar result is also observed for the degragation of methyl orange (MO) as shown in Fig. S2 (b). The improved property of BiOI/PAN-C30can be attributed to the good dispersionof BiOI andthelarge surface area of composite nanofibers which can facilitate the contact between photocatalyst and dye molecule.

The stress-strain curves for BiOI/PAN-C30 before and after three times of photocatalytic reaction are shown in Fig. S3. The values of E-Modulus and tensile strength are increased,whereas the elongation at break isdecreased for the samples after three cycles [1]. The above results suggest that these compositenanofibers become much stronger but relatively withlower elongation after three times of photocatalysis. And the enhanced strength might also favorable for the recycling use.

Fig. S4 shows TG analysisofthe BiOI/PAN-C30 composites nanofibers beforeandafterthreetimesof photocatalytic reactions.Afterphotocatalysis,the weight lossofthe composite above 600 degree arenearlythe sameasthat before photocatalysis, which clearly indicate that the weight percentage of BiOI in the BiOI/PAN nanofibers are nearly the same as that before photocatalysis and there is no obvious leaching of BiOI from the composite nanofibers. The above results suggest the close contact between BiOI and PAN nanofibersfor the BiOI/PAN composite nanofibers.

Reference:

1. Jalili R, Morshed M, Ravandi SAH (2006) J Appl Polym Sci 101 (6):4350-4357

Fig S1Photocatalytic degradation curves ofβ-phenol over different BiOI/PAN NFs and PAN NFs.

Fig. S2 Photocatalytic degradation of RhB (a) and MO (b) overBiOI/PAN-C30 and BiOI.

Fig.S3 Stress-strain curve for BiOI/PAN-C30 beforeand after three times photocatalytic reaction.

Fig. S4 TG curve for BiOI/PAN-C30 beforeand after three times photocatalytic reaction.