Sulfamethoxazole degradation by visible light assisted peroxymonosulfate process based on nanohybrid manganese dioxide incorporating ferric oxide

[Display omitted] •Nanohybrid MnO2 incorporating Fe2O3 (MF) as PMS activator was fabricated.•MF displayed excellent photoelectrochemical properties.•MF/PMS/PC system displayed high organic pollutions degradation efficiency in water.•The SMX decomposition pathway was illustrated and demonstrated.•The reactive mechanism of MF/PMS/PC system was proposed. In this study, the application potential of a nanohybrid MnO2 incorporating Fe2O3 (MF) as a peroxymonosulfate (PMS) activator was demonstrated under visible light irradiation. Due to the optical band structure of MF, electron dense regions could be formed by introducing Fe2O3 nanoparticles via photogenerated carriers migration. The PMS activation performance coupled with visible light photocatalysis was evaluated to remove various organic pollutants in water, specifically sulfamethoxazole, sulfacetamide, carbamazepine, malachite green, tartrazine, rhodamine B, and 4-chlorophenol, accordingly, 90.0 %, 91.5 %, 87.6 %, 93.1 %, 97.1 %, 100 %, and 94.8 % of degradation efficiencies were achieved. Besides, the initial pH and co-existing inorganic ions at diverse concentrations did not significantly affect the degradation efficiency. More important, the sulfamethoxazole degradation pathway and reaction mechanism of the MF/PMS/Vis system were proposed. Therefore, this work might provide new insights into the visible-light-assisted PMS activation mechanisms and is useful to construct environmentally-friendly catalytic processes for the efficient degradation of organic pollutants.