Retarded Decomposition of the Trimethylammonium Moiety Observed on Photocatalytic Mineralization of Surfactants over TiO2 Photocatalyst

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Abstract
The CO2 evolution rate for photocatalytic mineralization of alkyltrimethylammonium chloride sharply decreased when the mineralization yield became nearly equal to the proportion of the long alkyl carbon to the total organic carbon, suggesting that the photodecomposition rate of the alkyl chains is much faster than that of the trimethylammonium group. Moreover, the presence of Br− significantly suppressed the initial CO2 evolution rate, and resulted in incompleted mineralization with the final mineralization yield virtually equal to the proportion of the carbon atoms not attaching to the quarternary nitrogen.