Macroporous Resin-Based La-N Co-Doped TiO2 Composites for Efficient Removal of Environmental Pollutants in Water via Integrating Adsorption and Photocatalysis

Integrating photocatalysis with adsorption represents an efficient approach to improving the removal performance of organic contaminants from aqueous environments. To address the issues of severe charge recombination and poor adsorption activity in TiO2 photocatalysts during the photocatalytic degradation of organic pollutants. In this study, we used macroporous resin as a carrier and prepared La/N-doped TiO2/macroporous resin composite materials (La/N/TiO2-MAR) via a hydrothermal-assisted sol–gel method. The results show that the composite material has a spherical morphology. N can be doped into the TiO2 crystal, while La3+ remains on the surface of TiO2 without entering the crystal lattice. La/N/TiO2-MAR demonstrates a higher specific surface area and enhanced light absorption capacity, which facilitates both adsorption and photocatalytic degradation. At the La3+ doping concentration of 0.05 M, La0.05/N/TiO2-MAR demonstrates optimal photocatalytic degradation performance, achieving an 85.36% removal rate of Rhodamine B after 240 min of visible-light exposure.