AUTHOR=Lancel Maxime , Gomez Catherine , Port Marc , Amara Zacharias TITLE=Performances of Homogeneous and Heterogenized Methylene Blue on Silica Under Red Light in Batch and Continuous Flow Photochemical Reactors JOURNAL=Frontiers in Chemical Engineering VOLUME=3 YEAR=2021 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/chemical-engineering/articles/10.3389/fceng.2021.752364 DOI=10.3389/fceng.2021.752364 ISSN=2673-2718 ABSTRACT=

Methylene blue was efficiently immobilized on silica micro- and nanoparticles by electrostatic interactions and the performances of the heterogenized photocatalysts were compared against the homogeneous conditions using the photooxidation of citronellol as a model reaction under red light, in a batch and a continuous flow photochemical reactor. In batch, the heterogeneous photocatalyst outperforms the homogeneous one, presumably due to kinetic and stability effects. The two catalytic systems are also compared in a flow reactor displaying improved mass transfer properties. We demonstrate that this results in a dramatic enhancement in photocatalyst stability, reactivity and productivity. This study highlights the importance of photocatalyst stability under homogeneous versus heterogenized conditions and in batch versus flow photochemistry.