Diamond fibers for efficient electrocatalytic degradation of environmental pollutants

Abstract The efficient electrocatalytic degradation of environmental pollutants requires an electrode with a large surface area, high electrocatalytic activities, long-term stability, and a low cost. Herein, the diamond fibers (DFs) are synthesized by overgrowing the cost-effective carbon fibers as the core with a uniform boron dopped diamond (BDD) film as a shell. Since these fibrous core/shell-like DFs combine both features of BDD and carbon fiber, they are utilized as the electrode for the efficient electrocatalytic degradation of environmental pollutants. The DFs exhibit a 5.2-fold larger surface area and a 6.8-fold higher peak current density than those of a planar BDD electrode. Methyl orange is degraded below the limit of detection within 1.5 h using these DFs, while the degradation fraction using a planar BDD electrode is only 22%. For other various organic pollutants, these DFs exhibit excellent degradation capacity. Such a high performance of electrocatalytic degradation of these environmental pollutants originates from increased surface areas and active sites by the three-dimensional fibrous structure as well as the decreased charge-transfer resistance by the core/shell structure. These DFs are thus promising as a new electrode material or an electrocatalyst for various catalytic applications in the environmental and energy fields.