Graphene Modified Electro-Fenton Catalytic Membrane for in Situ Degradation of Antibiotic Florfenicol

Abstract

The removal of low-concentration antibiotics from water to alleviate the potential threat of antibiotic-resistant bacteria and genes calls for the development of advanced treatment technologies with high efficiency. In this study, a novel graphene modified electro-Fenton (e-Fenton) catalytic membrane (EFCM) was fabricated for in situ degradation of low-concentration antibiotic florfenicol. The removal efficiency was 90%, much higher than that of electrochemical filtration (50%) and single filtration process (27%). This demonstrated that EFCM acted not only as a cathode for e-Fenton oxidation process in a continuous mode but also as a membrane barrier to concentrate and enhance the mass transfer of florfenicol, which increased its oxidation chances. The removal rate of florfenicol by EFCM was much higher (10.2 ± 0.1 mg m h) than single filtration (2.5 ± 0.1 mg m h) or batch e-Fenton processes (4.3 ± 0.05 mg m h). Long-term operation and fouling experiment further demonstrated the durability and antifouling property of EFCM. Four main degradation pathways of florfenicol were proposed by tracking the degradation byproducts. The above results highlighted the feasibility of this integrated membrane catalysis process for advanced water purification.

Degradation of Hazardous Organics via Cathodic Flow-through Process Using a Spinel FeCo2O4/CNT Decorated Stainless-Steel Mesh

“…M (n+1)+ + e -→ M n+ (3) EF in batch reactors were intensively developed for environmental applications. Alternatively, EF process coupling with a cathodic flow-through process has recently attracted interests [7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16] since it substantially improved the mass transfer towards cathode by forced permeation, as well as provided a larger active electrode area by means of porous structures. Nevertheless, some research [8][9][10]12] only applied unmodified or commercial membranes as the cathodes without decorating active EF catalysts, limiting the removal efficiency.…”

“…Nevertheless, some research [8][9][10]12] only applied unmodified or commercial membranes as the cathodes without decorating active EF catalysts, limiting the removal efficiency. Also, the majority of leading research [7,8,[11][12][13][14][15] used Fe 2+ as the EF reactant, which is convenient but also has potential secondary pollution. [17] Therefore, it is necessary to improve the removal effectiveness of cathodic flow-through process with minimal secondary pollution by customizing a highly catalyticallyactive cathodic membrane.…”

Porous carbon monoliths for electrochemical removal of aqueous herbicides by “one-stop” catalysis of oxygen reduction and H2O2 activation

“…On the other hand, cathodic EAOP requires the electrochemical generation of H 2 O 2 via 2-electron ORR, which is further converted to •OH (Jiang, 2018a). Carbon-based materials are good 2-electron ORR catalysts because of their earth abundance, low toxicity, porosity and surface properties (Li, 2016b;Jiang, 2018b), and they have also been successfully coupled with Fe(II)/Fe(III) species to be used in electro-Fenton processes for the removal of a series of pesticides and herbicides.…”

“…Hydroxyl radical can be produced either via anodic water oxidation (Yang, 2014(Yang, , 2015 or by cathodic oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) (Liu, 2016;Zhao, 2017;Jiang, 2018a).…”

Graphene-Modified Composites and Electrodes and Their Potential Applications in the Electro-Fenton Process

“…The authors showed that the drop cast electrode exhibited good stability. Graphene oxide has also been deposited on stainless steel to create a membrane for the removal of paracetamol [74], and an electrode to oxidise and remove arsenic [5], while a PTFE membrane was modified with graphene and used as a catalytic membrane to both concentrate and oxidise an antibiotic [75].…”