A new approach for endowing photocatalytic performance to biochar based on peryleneimide: Emphasizing the achievement of highly efficient degradation to RhB.

Having unique structural characteristics of biochar contributes great potential in photocatalysis, the preparation process complexity is still a great challenge for biochar-based photocatalysts. Based on this, this study proposes a new, simple, efficient, and flexible approach to preparing biochar-based photocatalysts by perylene diimide (GPC/PDI). The results showed that the hybridization between GPC and PDI was achieved by π-π stacking, which was reduced with increasing pyrolysis temperature, increased first and then decreased with increasing PDI content, and improved with enhanced solvent polarity. When the pyrolysis temperature was 400 °C, the PDI addition was 0.05 mg, and the reaction solvent was water, the degradation of 200 mg/L rhodamine B (RhB) by GPC ₄₀₀ /PDI _0.5 was 94%, and the reaction rate constant was 10 and 4 times higher than GPC ₄₀₀ and PDI, which were also effective in simulating actual wastewater treatment. This was attributed to the efficient electron-hole separation and migration along the π-π stacking direction due to the hybridization of GPC and PDI, which in turn reacts to produce reactive oxygen species ( ¹ O ₂ , •O ₂ ^- , •OH), facilitating the photocatalytic degradation process.
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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