Low H 2 O 2 consumption Fenton-like catalysts for pollutant cleavage based on the construction of a dual reaction center.

High energy consumption has seriously hindered the development of Fenton-like reactions for the removal of refractory organic pollutants in water. To solve this problem, we designed a novel Fenton-like catalyst (Cu-PAN ₃ ) by coprecipitation and carbon thermal reduction. The catalyst exhibits excellent Fenton-like catalytic activity and stability for the degradation of various pollutants with low H ₂ O ₂ consumption. The experimental results indicate that the dual reaction centers (DRCs) are composed of Cu-N-C and Cu-O-C bridges between copper and graphene-like carbon, which form electron-poor/rich centers on the catalyst surface. H ₂ O ₂ is mainly reduced at electron-rich Cu centers to free radicals for pollutant degradation. Meanwhile, pollutants can be oxidized by donating electrons to the electron-poor C centers of the catalyst, which inhibits the ineffective decomposition of H ₂ O ₂ at the electron-poor centers. This therefore significantly reduces the consumption of H ₂ O ₂ and reduces energy consumption.
Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
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