Sulfamethazine (SMZ) is widely used in livestock feeding and aquaculture as an antibiotic agent and growth promoter. Widespread occurrence of SMZ in surface water, groundwater, soil and sediment has been reported. In this study, degradation of SMZ by heat-activated persulfate (PS) oxidation was investigated in aqueous solution. Experimental results demonstrated that SMZ degradation followed pseudo-first-order reaction kinetics. The pseudo-first-order rate constant (k(obs)) was increased markedly with increasing concentration of PS and temperature. Radical scavenging tests revealed that the predominant oxidizing species was SO4 center dot- with HO center dot playing a less important role. Aniline moiety in SMZ molecule was confirmed to be the reactive site for SO4 center dot- attack by comparison with substructural analogs. Nontarget natural water constituents affected SMZ removal significantly, e.g., Cl- and HCO3- improved the degradation while fulvic acid reduced it. Reaction products were enriched by solid phase extraction (SPE) and analyzed by liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization-triple quadrupole mass spectrometry (LC-ESI-MS/MS). 6 products derived from sulfonamide S-N bond cleavage, aniline moiety oxidation and Smiles-type rearrangement were identified, and transformation pathways of SMZ oxidation were proposed. Results reveal that heat-activated PS oxidation could be an efficient approach for remediation of water contaminated by SMZ and related sulfonamides. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.