A superfine glass fiber air filter with rapid response to photocatalytic antibacterial properties under visible light by loading rGO/ZnO

<p class="15">  The development of high-performance air filter has become more and more important to public health. However, it has always been very challenging for developing a multifunctional air filter to simultaneously achieve excellent filtration and antibacterial properties. Herein, a versatile air filter was prepared with loading the reduced graphener and Zinc oxide on the superfine glass fiber with the three-dimensional network structure by in-situ sol-gel process followed by calcination, which aims to achieve synergistic high efficiency air filtration and rapid response to photocatalytic antibacterial under visible light. The air filter showed a three-dimensional network structure based on a rGO/ZnO/s-GF multilayer and exhibited the highest catalytic performance by achieving a 95% degradation effect on Rhodamine B within 2 h and achieving 100% antibacterial inactivation of the Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus within 4 h under visible light when the weight ratio of rGO in rGO/ZnO is 1.6%. The air filtration efficiency can also be maintained at 99% after loading Zno and rGO photocatalytic particles. The spectrum of PL, DRS and ERS indicate that the combination of rGO and ZnO on the s-GF can increase the separation of photo-generated carriers and the specific surface area of the air filter, thereby increasing the photocatalytic response and antibacterial properties of the s-GF air filter under visible light in a short time.</p> <p> </p>