Welcome to 2021 research seminars by the University of Adelaide and hosted by the Joint Chemical and Industrial Chemistry Committee, South Australia.

In recent years, the sulfate radical based Fenton process has gradually attracted wide-spread attention due to its high oxidation potential and mild pH requirements. Sulfate radicals can be generated through the activation of persulfate by different technologies, such as heat, ultrasound and nanocatalysts.

In my group, based on density functional theory calculations and experiments, different nanocatalysts, such as nanocarbon, MoS2 nanolayer, were considered for the activation of persulfate to degrade typical aquatic organic pollutants. Through the serials works, the activation mechanism of persulfate, such as activation pathway: radical or nonradical pathway, was investigated. In addition, the activation efficiency could be tuned through different techniques, such as surface engineering, crystalline structure. For example, we investigated persulfate activation on nanocarbons, the effects of defects, such as vacancies, edges, doping, oxygen groups, external voltage, are considered.

The results show that surface engineering is an effect way to improve the activation efficiency, and the defects are active sites for the activation. On the other hand, tuning the crystalline structure, such as diamond/graphene interface, is also an efficient technique for the persulfate activation. Based on above works, the persulfate activation mechanism on nanocatalysts was deeply understood, which provides excellent guidance for its actual application on aquatic organic pollutants degradation.