Copper phthalocyanine onto KIT-6: A new photocatalyst for environmental application

The exploration of an efficient system that is able to use most of the solar energy and molecular oxygen for environmental application is particularly attractive and remains a great challenge [1,2]. Metal-phthalocyanines are among those which are most attractive [3]. In this work incorporation of copper phthalocyanine onto KIT-6 was investigated for decomposition of 4-chlorophenol in aqueous solutions. In this study, highly ordered three-dimensional mesoporous silica KIT-6 was synthesized via a one-step direct hydrothermal synthesis procedure employing Pluronic P123 triblock copolymer as the structure-directing agent. The material exhibits adequate textural parameters such as high surface area, large pore volume following our first experiences simply by altering the aging temperature. The unique structure of KIT-6 which is superior to other solid support is because of its three-dimensional interpenetrating bicontinuous networks of chiral channel [4]. This mesoporpos structure offers more active sites and resistance to agglomeration, thus allowing more reactant molecules and precursor solution diffusion through the pore channels [5]. The KIT-6 was functionalized with 3-(aminopropyl)-triethoxysilane (APTES) via post-synthesis method and then sulfonated cu-phthalocyanine was incorporated into KIT-6 using acidic media. Prepared materials were characterized by small-angle X-ray diffraction (XRD), nitrogen physisorption (BET), diffuse reflection spectroscopy (DRS), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and FT-IR techniques. The characterization results indicated that the pore structure of KIT-6 was well kept after the grafting of aminopropyl groups. Our studies showed that using DMSO is better solvent to load more phthalocyanine into the mesporous KIT-6. However, the very broad DR spectrum formed represents great aggregation of the Cu-phthalocyanine onto surface and walls of KIT-6. The work is progressing to find highest ability of the photocatalyst prepared at different conditions.