Binder-Free 3D Printed Polyurethane/Bi-MOFs Composites for Photocatalytic Degradation of Rhodamine-B

The modularization of metal-organic-frameworks (MOFs) powders is a crucial to bringing out the excellent properties of MOFs to industrial applications in water treatment, gas adsorption/separation and catalytic fields. To improve their practical application and recyclability, we propose a hybrid composite of biocompatible MOFs decorated on self-supported three-dimensional (3D) printed polyurethane acrylate (PUA) for wastewater treatment. In this study, we select Bi-based MOFs with good visible-light response and chemical stability as photocatalysts, two MOFs, bismuth gallate (Bi-GA) and bismuth ellagic acid (Bi-EA), are loaded into the mesh-like PUA template by in-situ growth method. And then, these two composites, PUA/Bi-GA and PUA/Bi-EA are used for the photocatalytic treatment of Rhodamine-B (RhB) dye. The results demonstrate that PUA/Bi-EA could reach the highest removal rate of 98.08 % under acidic conditions in 4 hours. The excellent performance should be attributed to unique structure that endow their high adsorption capacity for dyes, further, the adsorbed dye as a sensitizer enhances the utilization of sun-light. This study provides a new composite for advanced photocatalytic water treatment and other environmental purification.