Three-dimensional hierarchical Ag/Mg(Ni)Al-layered double hydroxide Janus micromotor derived from lotus pollen for active removal of organic pollutant

• Published in: Journal of materials science Vol. 57; no. 24; pp. 10953 - 10967
• Main Authors: Yang, Jie, Li, Jia, Yang, Ping, Xing, Ningning, Chen, Yaming, Zuo, Min, Li, TingTing
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer US 01.06.2022; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Adsorption; Aluminum; Biomass; Characterization and Evaluation of Materials; Chemical Routes to Materials; Chemistry and Materials Science; Classical Mechanics; Crystallography and Scattering Methods; Enzymes; Fourier transforms; Hydrogen peroxide; Hydroxides; Magnesium; Mass transfer; Materials Science; Micromotors; Morphology; Nanoparticles; Nickel; Pollen; Pollutants; Polymer Sciences; Porous materials; Silver; Solid Mechanics; Three dimensional flow
• ISSN: 0022-2461; 1573-4803
• DOI: 10.1007/s10853-022-07236-2

Micromotors have gained considerable attention in the field of environmental remediation owing to their self-propulsion motion that can efficiently accelerate the mass transfer and mixing in solution. Herein, we reported a novel Ag/Mg(Ni)Al-layered double hydroxide (LDH) Janus micromotor derived from lotus pollen for dynamic removal of organic pollutant from water. The as-prepared three-dimensional (3D) flower-sphere micromotor was composed of free-standing Mg(Ni)Al-LDH nanosheets half-deposited with Ag nanoparticles. Under the recoil force caused by the oxygen bubbles those were generated via the decomposition of H 2 O 2 catalyzed by Ag nanoparticles, Ag/Mg(Ni)Al-LDHs micromotors could move rapidly with a speed of 115.4 ± 10.3 μm s −1 (≈ 2.2 body lengths s −1 ) in 5 wt% H 2 O 2 . Furthermore, the maximum Congo red (CR) adsorption capacity of Ag/MgAl-LDH micromotor was up to 350.16 mg g −1 , which was 1.33 times greater than the MgAl-LDHs (non-micromotor). Meanwhile, the adsorption rate was significantly accelerated compared to the non-micromotor counterparts. The results show that the enhanced adsorption capacity of micromotor benefited from the combination of 3D porous microstructure with high surface area (209.7 m 2  g −1 ), electrostatic attraction and self-propelled movement. Graphical abstract