Visible light-powered catalysts clean up ‘forever chemicals’

Chemists in China and the US have discovered catalysts enabling light-driven reactions that can break down fluorine-containing chemicals that are attracting concern as pollutants. Two research groups separately harnessed a powerful new class of carbon-based catalysts that help break bonds between carbon and fluorine atoms, avoiding using and producing other harmful chemicals. ‘Our approach can remove almost all the fluorine,’ says Yan-Biao Kang from University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) in Hefei.