Efficient construction and enriched selective adsorption-photocatalytic activity of PVA/PANI/TiO2 recyclable hydrogel by electron beam radiation

Enriched selective adsorption-photocatalytic activity of Poly (vinyl alcohol)/Polyaniline/TiO 2 (PVA/PANI/TiO 2 , noted as PAT) recyclable hydrogel photocatalyst with 3D structures were prepared by self-assembling and electron beam radiation crosslingking method. TiO 2 nanoparticles were successfully introduced into the 3D matrix of the PVA/PANI hydrogel and manifested by FTIR, TG, XRD, XPS, and SEM-EDS. The microstructure of PAT was characterized further by SEM, TEM, and BET. The highly selective adsorption-photocatalytic activity of PAT was tested by the degradation of cationic or anionic dye and reduction of heavy metal ion in a closed and flow system under UV light irradiation. The results showed that PAT had a highest selective adsorption-photocatalytic performance at the appropriate content of PVA (10 wt %), TiO 2 (15 wt %) and suitable radiation dose (50 kGy), which could be attributed to the synergistic effect of excellent selective adsorption and effective photocatalytic degradation. The mechanism of selective adsorption-photocatalytic on PAT was revealed synchronously in this study. Particularly, the novel PAT photocatalyst with 3D network structure also affords ease of separation and recycling, which is beneficial to water purification in a flow system. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2020 , 137 , 48516.