CleanNanoCatalyze – In situ pollutants removal from waters by sustainable green nanotechnologie

Project aim: CleanNanoCatalyze project handles development of advanced materials for photocatalysis of organic compound water pollutants, and designing of sensor system for monitoring of photocatalysis efficiency by measurement of total organic carbon (TOC) content during the process.

 

About the project: CleanNanoCatalyze deals with burning topics of today, which is water purification and water quality monitoring. Project tasks include the development of a photocatalysis system, which has a sensor implemented in the construction to monitor the total content of organic matter. The main goal of the project is to obtain a new material based on ZnO, in the form of powder and film, to establish a link between the structural and functional (morphological and electrical) properties and efficiency of photocatalysis in the given process parameters. Environmentally friendly green technologies will be used to obtain the powder shaped materials, which will be further formed into thick films using screen printing. Innovation in the development of the material and the process in general will be searched in combining of additional oxides with ZnO, in order to increase the efficiency of photocatalysis in the visible part of the wavelength spectrum, while adjusting the environmental process parameters in the reactor. Also, testing the photocatalytic efficiency of thick films will be explored since the films themselves represent a better solution in reactor design because powder filtration is not required, and a continuous process may be allowed. For evaluation of the efficiency of photocatalysis, a sensor of organic matter will be developed, which works on the principle of UV absorption. For sensor development, a cheap solution will be designed, through dedicated electronics, and an LED optical system, with signal processing. The entire system will be adapted for sampling from the reactor for the monitoring of organic molecules decomposition in defined time intervals. In addition to the use of photocatalytic materials for water purification, the efficiency of sub-critical water will be examined by members of the project team from the Faculty of Technology Novi Sad. The Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics in Novi Sad and the BioSense Institute will participate in the implementation of activities in the development, characterization and testing of new materials. Extensive research on the content and impact of organic matter (pesticides) will be performed at the Scientific Veterinary Institute “Novi Sad”.