• Proceedings of the KAIS Fall Conference
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• 2003.06a
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• pp.350-352
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• 2003

In this study plastic optical fibers(POFs) were considered as light-transmitting media and substrates for the potential use in photocatalytic environmental purification system. After the characteristics of POFs in terms of light transmittance and absorption were determined at the beginning, the detailed investigation was further performed through the photocatalytic degradation of trichloroethylene(TCE), iso-propanol and etc. with TiO$_2$-coated optical fiber reactor systems(POFR). It is concluded that the use of POfs is preferred to quartz optical fibers(QOFs) since the advantages such as ease of handling, lower cost, relatively reasonable light attenuation at the wavelength of near 400nm can be obtained. Various geometrical reactor shapes have been constructed and applied for the last one and half years. For the use of POF in water phase treatment, however, more detailed scientific and engineering aspects should be envisaged. This case requires a suitable mixture to obtain more stable and innocuous immobilization of photocatalyst on POF.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Visualization
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.42-48
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• 2022

The shortage of available freshwater is a major global issue worldwide and an increasing demand for clean water requires efficient water purification strategies. Here we describe a method to drastically increase the efficiency of a microreactor for photocatalytic water purification. To find out how the shape of the catalyst affects water purification, nanostructured catalysts of different structures, such as dense film, nanorod, and nanohelix, are prepared and their water purification characteristics are analyzed. Compared to the flat catalyst, the nanostructured catalyst showed a distinct ability in its pollutant degradation, but the detailed structural variation does not significantly affect the water purification. To further increase efficiency, we apply a micromixer to nanorod-based microreactor, which allows even enhanced mass transfer. This enables the solution of the water purification problem and greatly contributes to the industries where the efficiency of photocatalytic activity has attracted extensive interest.

• Rapid Communication in Photoscience
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.42-45
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• 2013

Natural photosynthesis utilizes solar energy to convert carbon dioxide and water to energy-rich carbohydrates. Substantial use of sunlight to meet world energy demands requires energy storage in useful fuels via chemical bonds because sunlight is intermittent. Artificial photosynthesis research focuses the fundamental natural process to design solar energy conversion systems. Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide ($NAD^+$) and $NADP^+$ are ubiquitous as electron transporters in biological systems. Enzymatic, chemical, and electrochemical methods have been reported for NADH regeneration. As photochemical systems, visible light-driven catalytic activity of NADH regeneration was carried out using platinum nanoparticles, molecular rhodium and cobalt complexes in the presence of triethanolamine as a sacrificial electron donor. Pt nanoparticles showed photochemical NADH regeneration activity without additional visible light collector molecules, demonstrating that both photoactivating and catalytic activities exist together in Pt nanoparticles. The NADH regeneration of the Pt nanoparticle system was not interfered with the reduction of $O_2$. Molecular cobalt complexes containing dimethylglyoxime ligands also transfer their hydrides to $NAD^+$ with photoactivation of eosin Y in the presence of TEOA. In this photocatalytic reaction, the $NAD^+$ reduction process competed with a proton reduction.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Surface Engineering Conference
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• 2016.11a
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• pp.59-75
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• 2016

Reduced or black $TiO_{2-x}$ materials with oxygen-deficiency have been achieved by creating oxygen vacancies and/or defects at the surface using different methods. Fascinatingly, they exhibited an extended absorption in VIS and IR instead of only UV light with bandgap decrease from 3.2 (anatase) to ~1 eV. However, despite the dramatic enhancement of optical absorption in black $TiO_{2-x}$ materials, they have failed to show expected visible light-assisted water splitting efficiency. This was ascribed to the high concentration of the surface defects and/or oxygen vacancies, considered as an electron donor to enhance donor density and improve the charge transportation in black $TiO_2$ can also act as charge recombination centers, which eventually decrease photocatalytic activity. Therefore, a black ot reducd $TiO_2$ material with optimized properties would be highly desired for visible light photocatalysis. In this report, a new controlled magnesiothermic reduction has been developed to synthesize reduced black $TiO_{2-x}$ in the presence $H_2/Ar$ for photocatalytic $H_2$ production from methanol-water system. The material possesses an optimum band gap and band position, oxygen vacancies, and surface defects and shows significantly improved optical absorption in the visible and infrared region. The synergistic effects enable the reduced $TiO_{2-x}$ material to show an excellent hydrogen production ability along with long-term stability under the full solar wavelength range of light and visible light, respectively, in the methanol-water system in the presence of Pt as a co-catalyst. These values are superior to those of previously reported black $TiO_2$ materials. On the basis of all the results, it can be realized that the outstanding activity and stability of the reduced of $TiO_{2-x}$ NPs suggest that a balanced combination of different factors like $Ti^{3+}$, surface defects, oxygen vacancy, and recombination center is achieved along with optimized bandgap and band position during the preparation employing magnesiothermic reduction in the presence of $H_2$. The controlled magnesiothermic reduction in the presence of $H_2$ is one of the best alternative ways to produce active and stable $TiO_2-based$ photocatalyst for $H_2$ production.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.4 no.3
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• pp.199-203
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• 2003

In this study plastic optical fibers (POFs) were considered as light-transmitting media and substrates for the potential use in photocatalytic environmental purification system. After the characteristics of POFs in terms of light transmittance and absorption were determined at the beginning, the further investigation was performed through the photocatalytic degradation of trichloroethylene (TCE), iso-propanol and etc. with TiO$_2$-coated optical fiber reactor systems (POFR). It is concluded that the use of POFs is preferred to quartz optical fibers (QOFs) since the advantages such as ease of handling, lower cost, relatively reasonable light attenuation at the wavelength of near 400nm can be obtained. Various geometrical reactor shapes have been constructed and applied for the last one and half years. For the use of POF in water phase treatment, however, more detailed scientific and engineering aspects should be envisaged. This case requires a suitable mixture to obtain more stable and innocuous immobilization of photocatalyst on POF. To overcome this disadvantage, metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) was conducted in a fluidized bed to deposit thin films of titania on glass and alumina beads. Those can be used as photocatalysis for the removal of pollutants especially in liquid phases.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.51 no.3
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• pp.297-302
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• 2013

Enhancement of photocatalytic activity of UV/photocatalysis was carried out to oxidize the gaseous $H_2S$ in a tubular reactor coated with photocatalyst of sol type $TiO_2$. EtOH was used as the standard material to select the photocatalyst, and it was confirmed that the reactor activity was dependent on the coated surface characteristics. The selected photocatalytic reactor, which coated with STS-01, showed about 80% conversion when the gas linear velocity was 0.01 m/s and relative humidity was 40%. However, the conversion level of the reaction decreased significantly with increasing gas linear velocity. Pt was loaded on the photocatalyst to enhance and maintain the performance of the reactor, which enhanced the conversion level of $H_2S$ more than 95% under the same experimental condition.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.51 no.1
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• pp.116-120
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• 2013

Characteristics of photocatalytic CO removal process conducting CO conversion by using Pt loaded $TiO_2$ photocatalyst were investigated in a photocatalytic tubular reactor. Effects of Pt loading method onto $TiO_2$, linear velocity of gas stream containing CO gas, CO concentration and moisture content in the gas stream on the conversion of CO to $CO_2$ were examined. It was found that the CO gas could be removed almost 100% by using photocatalytic tubular reactor internally coated with Pt/$TiO_2$ photocatalyst under UV irradiation, when the linear velocity of gas stream was in the range of 0.01~0.25 m/s and CO concentration in the gas stream was ranged from 20 to 100 ppm and the relative humidity of the gas stream was in the range of 20~40%. The conversion of CO gas decreased gradually with increasing linear velocity of gas stream and CO concentration in the gas stream. The moisture in the gas stream could promote the removal of CO gas by means of the generation of OHradicals.

• Clean Technology
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.285-292
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• 2022

Adsorption tower systems based on activated carbon adsorption towers have mainly been employed to reduce the emission of volatile organic compounds (VOCs), a major cause of air pollution. However, the activated carbon currently used in these systems has a short lifespan and thus requires frequent replacement. An approach to overcome this shortcoming could be to develop metal oxide photocatalysis-activated carbon composites capable of degrading VOCs by simultaneously utilizing photocatalytic activation and powerful adsorption by activated carbon. TiO₂ has primarily been used as a metal oxide photocatalyst, but it has low economic efficiency due to its high cost. In this study, ZnO particles were synthesized as a photocatalyst due to their relatively low cost. Silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs) were deposited on the ZnO surface to compensate for the photocatalytic deactivation that arises from the wide band gap of ZnO. A microfluidic process was used to synthesize ZnO particles and Ag NPs in separate reactors and the solutions were continuously supplied with a pack bed reactor loaded with activated carbon powder. This microfluidic-assisted pack bed reactor efficiently prepared a Ag-ZnO-activated carbon composite for VOC removal. Analysis confirmed that Ag-ZnO photocatalytic particles were successfully deposited on the surface of the activated carbon. Conducting a toluene gasbag test and adsorption breakpoint test demonstrated that the composite had a more efficient removal performance than pure activated carbon. The process proposed in this study efficiently produces photocatalysis-activated carbon composites and may offer the potential for scalable production of VOC removal composites.

• Rapid Communication in Photoscience
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.64-66
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• 2013

Photoreduction of $CO_2$ into hydrocarbon fuels on the surface of photocatalyst is one of the breakthroughs in the field of photocatalysis. At present various approaches have been investigated with the aim of increasing the $CO_2$ conversion efficiency. The reactor for photoconversion of $CO_2$ plays a vital role in experimental setup. In this work an attempt was made to testify a newly designed the photoreactor for conversion of $CO_2$ into useful products. The photoreactor was specifically designed for simple operation bearing features of temperature and pressure control. The reactor has been tested successively with the standard titania, Degussa P25 yielding methane with moderate production rate of 30.8 $ppm{\cdot}g^{-1}{\cdot}h^{-1}$ under UV lamp with 365 nm wavelength. The methane yield obtained is comparable to the values reported in literature. Thus we anticipate that this experimental setup equipped with newly designed photoreactor can yield competitive amounts of fuels from $CO_2$ photoredcution via 365 nm UV light illumination on various photocatalysts.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.17 no.11
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• pp.1195-1201
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• 2008

Enhancing with non-metallic elemental nitrogen(N) is one of several methods that have been proposed to modify the electronic properties of bulk titanium dioxide($TiO_2$), in order to make $TiO_2$ effective under visible-light irradiation. Accordingly, current study evaluated the feasibility of applying visible-light-induced $TiO_2$ enhanced with N element to cleanse aromatic compounds, focusing on xylene isomers at indoor air quality(IAQ) levels. The N-enhanced $TiO_2$ was prepared by applying two popular processes, and they were coated by applying two well-known methods. For three o-, m-, and p-xylene, the two coating methods exhibited different photocatalytic oxidation(PCO) efficiencies. Similarly, the two N-doping processes showed different PCO efficiencies. For all three stream flow rates(SFRs), the degradation efficiencies were similar between o-xylene and m,p-xylene. The degradation efficiencies of all target compounds increased as the SFR decreased. The degradation efficiencies determined via a PCO system with N-enhanced visible-light induced $TiO_2$ was somewhat lower than that with ultraviolet(UV)-light induced unmodified $TiO_2$, which was reported by previous studies. Nevertheless, it is noteworthy that PCO efficiencies increased up to 94% for o-xylene and 97% for the m,p-xylene under lower SFR(0.5 L $min^{-1}$). Consequently, it is suggested that with appropriate SFR conditions, the visible-light-assisted photocatalytic systems could also become important tools for improving IAQ.