Promoting interfacial charge separation for efficient photocatalysis of organic dyes using ESM-solidified TiO2-based coupling materials

Improving the separation efficiency of photogenerated electron-hole pairs is crucial for the enhancement of semiconductor photocatalytic performance, and semiconductor-coupled strategies have attracted much attention due to their numerous advantages as well as perfect results in improving photocatalytic activity. Herein, we report a TiO 2 -based composite photocatalytic material solidified on eggshell membrane (ESM), a kitchen waste-biomass material that is usually considered as a waste. TiO 2 -WO 3 NPs were efficiently adsorbed on the ESM fiber network with a large specific surface area (TiO 2 -WO 3 -ESM), and the photocatalytic activity was remarkably enhanced, realizing a highly efficient catalytic degradation of the organic pollutant in water, methylene blue (MB) in water. The composites remained highly stable after five cycles of recycling, and in addition, the catalytic materials were well adapted to the natural water environment and showed significant decolorization effects on the other four dyes. This study provides new ideas for designing other efficient systems for the purification of dye wastewater.