Controllable synthesis of janus Cu2O/ZnO nanoarchitectures for photothermal enhanced fenton catalytic-driven dye contaminant degradation

A janus polydopamine-coated Cu 2 O/ZnO nanoarchitectures (ZnCuO@PDA) is presented and show favorable applications in environmental remediation, specifically dye degradation. The nanoarchitectures consisted of a heterostructure co-composed of the N-type semiconductor ZnO and the narrow bandgap P-type semiconductor Cu 2 O as the core. The formation of the Cu 2 O/ZnO heterojunction lowered the rate of electron-hole complexation, and the PDA provided the nanomaterials with excellent photo-thermal properties and active sites, which worked together to enhance the degradation rate for dye by photothermal enhanced Fenton catalytic effect. Rhodamine B (RhB) was served as modal dye contaminant, then the degradation experiments showed that the low concentration of ZnCuO@PDA exhibited excellent dye degradation over a wide pH range. Furthermore, ZnCuO@PDA exhibits favorable biocompatibility and recyclability, making it an environmentally sustainable and economically multiphase catalytic system. This innovation presents a novel approach for effective dye degradation.