Activities of BiFeO3/carbon-dots catalysts in piezo-photocatalytic degradation of ciprofloxacin upon light/ultrasonic excitation

Designing catalysts that can effectively make use of renewable energy benefits to solve the current challenges of environmental pollution and increasing energy demands. Piezo-photocatalysis that can utilize solar energy and natural vibration-energy has emerged as a “green” technique. In this work, we fabricated BiFeO3/C nano composites that can harvest solar and vibration energies and degrade organic pollutants. The incorporated carbon quantum dots bring about more efficient visible light absorbance and separation of photoinduced electron-hole pairs. The piezoelectric polarization further suppresses the recombination of photoinduced electron-hole pairs. The catalysts own higher reaction rates in piezo-photocatalysis and the BiFeO3/C-0.12 shows the highest degradation efficiency (k-value of 0.0835 min−1).