Diclofenac Degradation by Radiocatalysis

Water is one of the most important resource on the planet. Water pollution has become a global problem and have been identified various sources of pollution such as sewage discharge, industrial effluents and agricultural runoff and their potential has been studied in mass. From an environmental view, two approaches to dealing with water pollution are to reduce the sources and to treat the water to remove pollutants or convert them to forms that can be disposed of safely Advanced oxidation processes are widely studied for the treatment of toxic compounds; photocatalysis and radiolysis have been used in the treatment of persistent organic compounds. Radiocatalysis is a process analogous to heterogeneous photocatalysis wherein activation occurs through absorption of ionizing radiation rather than visible or ultraviolet photons. New and emerging pollutants present a new global water quality challenge with potentially-serious threats to human health and ecosystems. Pharmaceuticals, personal care products and endocrine disrupting compounds are among the prime examples of emerging contaminants. Diclofenac is a prevalent anti-inflammatory drug used throughout the world. Its frequent occurrence in freshwater environments and its potential toxicity towards several organisms such as fish and mussels makes diclofenac an emerging environmental contaminant. In this work, radiocatalysis was studied as advanced oxidation process for the degradation of diclofenac. For this, commercial titanium oxide was used as catalyst. The samples were exposed to gamma radiation using an irradiator, which is provided with a 60Co source (gamma ray energies: 1.17 and 1.33 MeV). Some variations in conditions of irradiation (doses and ambient air) were used to determine their effect in process. The effect of adding the deposited catalyst on the degradation of diclofenac was observed and some differences in both processes, photocatalysis and radiocatalysis, were found.