Topotactic formation of poriferous (Al,C)–Ta2O5 mesocrystals for improved visible-light photocatalysis

Poriferous monocrystal-like nanostructures are contributing to fabricate long-distance charge transfer pathways and rapid diffusions of the degraded products, and attracts wide attentions. In this work, layered and poriferous (Al,C)–Ta 2 O 5 mesocrystals were fabricated by topotactic transformation strategy with Ta 4 AlC 3 MAX as starting materials for visible-light photocatalytic antibiotic degradation. The prepared sample exhibited enhanced visible-light absorption and visible-light photocatalytic performance, far superior to those of commercial Ta 2 O 5 and Ta 4 AlC 3 MAX, which was mainly because of the elemental doping in the samples. The experimental results also indicated that continuous attacks of the photo-generated holes and ·O 2 − species efficiently induced efficient visible-light photodegradation of tetracycline . Current work also indicates a new and potential tantalum-based semiconductors for high-performance environmental photocatalysis .