In situ anchoring of bimetal (Cu, Fe) sulfides featured by sulfur vacancy and phosphorus doping within porous carbon nanocubes derived from Prussian blue analogs to activate peroxymonosulfate for the efficient degradation of organic pollutants

In this work, Prussian blue analogues (CuFe-PBA) derived copper-iron sulfides/N-doped porous carbon composite (CuFe-NC-SP-x) was prepared as an effective peroxymonosulfate (PMS) activator to degrade sulfadiazine (SDZ). A strategy that kills two birds with one stone was proposed to construct CuFe-NC-SP-x, i.e., S-etched CuFe-PBA (CuFe-PBA-S) was annealed with NaH2PO2 in N2 atmosphere to simultaneously introduce sulfur vacancy (Sv) and phosphorus doping. 40 μM SDZ was completely removed by CuFe-NC-SP-2/PMS in 20 min (0.2 g/L catalyst and 0.5 mM PMS). The kobs value obtained by CuFe-NC-SP-2 (0.48 min−1) was nearly 33 and 17 times higher than that of CuFe-PBA (0.014 min−1) and CuFe-PBA-S (0.028 min−1), respectively. Quenching tests, electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) analysis indicated that PMS activation in the system involved radical pathway (26.1 % OH and 22.7 % SO4–) and non-radical pathway (17.8 % 1O2 and 33.4 % electron transfer process). OH, SO4– and 1O2 were mainly produced by S enhanced metal sites for PMS activation. The synergistic effect of Sv and P doping enabled the powerful electron transfer mechanism. Electrochemical tests and DFT calculations demonstrated that Sv existing in CuFe-NC-SP-x improved the electron donor ability and increased the adsorption energy toward PMS, and phosphorus doping accelerated the electron transport from SDZ to PMS. This work not only provides a novel strategy to synthesize a high effective PMS activator by introducing Sv and phosphorous doing in one step, but also manages to comprehensively understand the electron transfer activation mechanisms of PMS facilitated by Sv and phosphorous doping.