Piezocatalytic performance difference of graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) derived from different precursors

In this paper, four types of graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) are prepared from different precursors by thermal polycondensation method and the piezocatalytic performance difference of the obtained g-C3N4 materials are investigated in detail. g-C3N4 derived from thiourea delivers best piezocatalytic performance basing on KMnO4 reduction experiment and rhodamine B degradation experiment. According to the differences of piezocatalytic performance of these g-C3N4 materials, effects of morphology, composition and defects on piezocatalytic performances are discussed. Reactive oxygen species (ROS) capture experiment showed that g-C3N4 could produce ROS through piezoelectric effect and hydroxyl radical (•OH) played a major role in pollutant degradation.