Mechanical Energy-Harvesting Piezo-Biocatalytic Heterojunction for Sustainable Marine Antifouling

Marine biofouling represents a persistent threat to sustainable ocean industries, elevating operational costs and accelerating infrastructure degradation. While conventional biocide-releasing coatings demonstrate antifouling efficacy, their environmental toxicity necessitates the development of eco-friendly alternatives. Herein, we present a mechanical energy-harvesting piezo-biocatalytic system for sustainable marine antifouling, leveraging a CeO₂-BaTiO₃ (Ce-BTO) heterojunction with a synergistic triple-catalytic mechanism. The integration of piezoelectric BaTiO₃ and CeO₂ nanozyme not only enhances charge separation and suppresses recombination to boost piezocatalytic reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation, but also exploits an electron injection effect to augment haloperoxidase-like activity, enabling in situ production of biocidal hypobromous acid (HOBr) in seawater. Furthermore, Ce-BTO exhibits DNA hydrolase-like activity that specifically degrades extracellular DNA (eDNA)-a key structural component of extracellular polymeric substances-thereby disrupting biofilm integrity. This concerted action of ROS/HOBr-mediated biocidal effects and eDNA hydrolysis confers Ce-BTO with potent, broad-spectrum anti-microbial and anti-algal performance, while remaining non-toxic to non-target marine organisms. In a six-month marine field test, coatings incorporating Ce-BTO achieved superior antifouling performance, markedly surpassing a commercial Cu₂O-based antifouling paint. By harnessing renewable ocean mechanical energy and green catalytic chemistry, this piezo-biocatalytic strategy offers a promising and sustainable pathway for next-generation antifouling technologies.