Reported by: Xiao Ke
Photographed by: Xiao Ke
Translated by: Qiao Xuechao
Edited by: Garrick Jones
Professor You Shijie and PHD candidate Liu Guoshuai who are the members of the academician Ren Nanqi’s team from the National key laboratory of urban water resources and water environment, recently published their research achievements — nonlinear optical material efficiently using photocatalysis technology to denitrification on the world-famous journal of environmental sciences and engineering field Environmental Science & Technology, which was published as Headline News on the home page.
Nitrates in water environments can cause water eutrophication, and trigger the potential risk of methemoglobinemia and cyanosis diseases after entering into the human body. It has been a tough issue in the field of water treatment to eliminate the low concentration of nitrate in the water. The traditional methods have the problems of inefficiency, weak selectivity and uncontrollable side reaction and other problems. Researchers in HIT first reveal the rules of using nonlinear optical material to efficiently photocatalyze and restore the nitrate in the water, and the removal rate can reach 98%, the selectivity of Nitrogen is up to 95%. The research shows that nonlinear optical material, differing from the traditional semiconductor material, has unique internal polarization effects, which can avoid the recombination between the electron hole and the electron. This kind of material can also facilitate the direct heterogeneous reduction of nitrate with electron on conduction bond, which can get higher reduction efficiency and stability. This research provides new thoughts, new materials and new methods for the efficient, easy and green elimination of nitrates in water.
Website of the paper: http://pubs.acs.org/journal/esthag
