Development of A Novel High Throughput Photo-catalyst Screening Procedure: UV-A Degradation of 17α-Ethinylestradiol with Doped TiO2-Based Photo-catalysts

The rising pollution of surface water by endocrine disruptive chemicals (EDCS) could lead to the persistent harm of aquatic wildlife. Addressing this concern, advanced waste water treatment techniques should be established in addition to the present sewage treatment. Therefore, the promising advanced oxidation process of photocatalysis is discussed. With the aim of establishing a novel high throughput screening approach for photocatalysts, a workflow resting upon the use of a self-constructed 60-fold parallel stirring UV-A LED photoreactor, followed by parallel sample extraction by SPE and sequential automated analysis by GC-MS, was developed, and is presented in this article. With the described system, TiO2-based photocatalysts, doped with different amounts of zinc, and synthesised by a sol-gel-route, were tested regarding their activity in the photocatalytic degradation of the synthetic estrogen 17α-ethinylestradiol. Thereby, the functional behavior of the photoreactor system and its applicability in a high throughput process could be evaluated. As a result of the catalyst screening, TiO2 catalysts with low amounts of zinc were found with a significantly higher activity, compared to undoped TiO2. In conclusion, the presented system provides an easily accessible high throughput method for a variety of photocatalytic experiments.