Oral Presentation Royal Australian Chemical Institute National Congress 2026

Room temperature conversion of perfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) to safe products (136246)

Cameron Shearer 1 , Mahmoud Hamza 1 , Rachael Matthews 1 , Mabel Day 1 , Chantelle Falanga 1
  1. Adelaide University, Adelaide, SOUTH AUSTRALIA, Australia

Per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) constitute a class of persistent organic pollutant that severely affects human health and the environment owing to their persistence, bioaccumulation and resistance to degradation.1

 Photocatalysis is a light-assisted catalysis in which photoexcited electrons and holes are used to drive reduction and oxidation reactions, respectively.2 In this presentation, I will discuss our progress in the development of materials and processes for the photocatalytic degradation of PFAS. We have found control of pH of reaction is essential to achieve PFAS oxidation. Metal sulfides consisting of d10 transition metals often have high reduction potential.3 I will present our progress toward sunlight-activated photocatalytic mineralization of PFAS by targeting photo-reduction using various metal sulfide systems.

 The collapse of cavitation bubbles produced by irradiation of PFAS samples with high frequency ultrasound is an attractive method for ‘room temperature’ thermal degradation of PFAS. We have applied ultrasonic degradation to field-derived PFAS samples.4 I will present our findings on the effect of co-contaminant and our efforts to improve degradation rate by pre-treatment of PFAS solutions prior to ultrasonic degradation.

  References: 

  1. Winstanley, Y, ... Shearer, C, Robker, R, Drinking water quality impacts oocyte viability and embryo development. Front. Reprod. Health 2024, 6, 1394099.
  2. Shearer, C., et. al.., Gas phase photocatalytic water splitting of moisture in ambient air: Toward reagent-free hydrogen production. J. Photochem. Photobiol., A 2020, 401, 112757.
  3. Hamza, M.;… Shearer, C., Atomic Ru Species over Ultrathin CdIn2S4 Nanosheets for Photocatalytic Valorisation of Biomass Intermediates and Green Hydrogen production. Chem. Eng. J. 2024, 493, 152603.
  4. Shearer, C, et. al.. Processes for recovering pfas from solid sorbents. WO2022256863A1, 2021.