Publication date: 15th December 2025
Photocatalysis offers an environmentally friendly strategy for transforming pollutants into valuable chemicals while enabling efficient water purification. Realizing this potential requires materials that operate under visible light, maintain stability in continuous operation, and display high selectivity toward targeted products. In this talk, I will present two photocatalytic systems developed in our group that address these challenges from complementary perspectives.
The first focuses on gas-phase CO2 conversion using EDOT-based donor–acceptor–donor trimers as visible-light-responsive organic photocatalysts.[1],[2] By tuning the molecular acceptor units, we modulate packing, electronic structure, and excited-state behavior, enabling selective formation of C2 hydrocarbons under continuous flow. This modular molecular design provides a pathway to guide charge separation and reaction selectivity using fully organic-based photocatalysts.
The second system targets microplastic removal and degradation using 3D-printed silicon carbide architectures with interconnected porous networks. Their tailored geometry enhances light utilization, solid–solid contact, and mechanical robustness, enabling efficient microplastic capture and oxidation in both static and flow conditions.[3]
Together, these results illustrate how molecular design and material engineering can advance photocatalysis toward practical, sustainable environmental remediation.
The research was funded by the European Union (ERC, PhotoSwim, 101076680). Views and opinions expressed are however, those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Research Council. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them. This publication is also part of the grant PID2022-136886OA-I00 financed by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033/ FEDER, UE. K.V. acknowledges the support from the Spanish Ministry of Science (MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033) and the European Union (Next generation EU/PRTR) through the Ramón y Cajal grant, RYC2021-031075-I. The authors thank the CERCA Program/Generalitat de Catalunya, and Severo Ochoa Excellence Accreditation CEX2024-001469-S funded by MCIU/AEI/10.13039/501100011033.
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