title: Monolithic Ceramic Foams for Ultrafast Photocatalytic Inactivation of Bacteria.
abstract: Palladium-modified nitrogen-doped titanium dioxide (TiON/PdO) foams were synthesized by a sol-gel process on a polyurethane foam template. The TiON/PdO foam was tested for microbial killing using Escherichia coli cells as a target. Under visible-light illumination, the TiON/PdO foam displayed a strong antimicrobial effect on the bacteria cells in water. The antimicrobial effect was found to be dependent on the palladium content and the calcination temperature. In a flow-through dynamic photoreactor, the new photocatalyst efficiently inactivated E. coli within a short contact time (< 1 min), the shortest ever reported for photocatalytic killing of bacteria. The strong antimicrobial functions of the TiON/PdO foam were related to the charge trapping by PdO and to the high contact efficiency of the foam structure.
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801, USA.
authors.forename: Pinggui
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.forename: Rongcai
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Xie
authors.forename: Kari
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Imlay
authors.forename: Jian Ku
authors.initials: JK
authors.lastname: Shang