Chinese Journal of Catalysis

Chinese Journal of Catalysis ›› 2020, Vol. 41 ›› Issue (1): 114-121.DOI: 10.1016/S1872-2067(19)63459-5

• Photocatalytic H2 production • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Photocatalytic H2 generation via CoP quantum-dot-modified g-C3N4 synthesized by electroless plating

Kezhen Qia,b, Wenxiu Lva, Iltaf Khanc, Shu-yuan Liud,e   

  1. a Institute of Catalysis for Energy and Environment, College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Shenyang Normal University, Shenyang 110034, Liaoning, China;
    b Research Institute of Photocatalysis, State Key Laboratory of Photocatalysis on Energy and Environment, College of Chemistry, Fuzhou University, Fuzhou 350116, Fujian, China;
    c Key Laboratory of Functional Inorganic Material Chemistry, Ministry of Education, School of Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Materials, Heilongjiang University, Harbin 158308, Heilongjiang, China;
    d Department of Pharmacology, Shenyang Medical College, Shenyang 110034, Liaoning, China;
    e Key Laboratory for Photonic and Electronic Bandgap Materials, Ministry of Education, College of Physics and Electronic Engineering, Harbin Normal University, Harbin 150025, Heilongjiang, China
  • Received:2019-07-05 Revised:2019-07-23 Online:2020-01-18 Published:2019-10-22
  • Supported by:
    This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (51602207), the Doctoral Scientific Research Foundation of Liaoning Province (20170520011), the Program for Liaoning Excellent Talents in Universities (LR2017074), the Open Project Program of the State Key Laboratory of Photocatalysis on Energy and Environment (SKLPEE-201810), Fuzhou University, the Scientific Research Project of the Educational Department of Liaoning Province (LQN201712), and Shenyang Excellent Talents in Universities (RC180211).

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Abstract: Photocatalytic water splitting is a promising method for hydrogen production. Numerous efficient photocatalysts have been synthesized and utilized. However, photocatalysts without a noble metal as the co-catalyst have been rarely reported. Herein, a CoP co-catalyst-modified graphitic-C3N4 (g-C3N4/CoP) is investigated for photocatalytic water splitting to produce H2. The g-C3N4/CoP composite is synthesized in two steps. The first step is related to thermal decomposition, and the second step involves an electroless plating technique. The photocatalytic activity for hydrogen evolution reactions of g-C3N4 is distinctly increased by loading the appropriate amount of CoP quantum dots (QDs). Among the as-synthesized samples, the optimized one (g-C3N4/CoP-4%) shows exceptional photocatalytic activity as compared with pristine g-C3N4, generating H2 at a rate of 936 μ mol g-1 h-1, even higher than that of g-C3N4 with 4 wt% Pt (665 μmol g-1 h-1). The UV-visible and optical absorption behavior confirms that g-C3N4 has an absorption edge at 451 nm, but after being composited with CoP, g-C3N4/CoP-4% has an absorption edge at 497 nm. Furthermore, photoluminescence and photocurrent measurements confirm that loading CoP QDs to pristine g-C3N4 not only enhances the charge separation, but also improves the transfer of photogenerated e--h+ pairs, thus improving the photocatalytic performance of the catalyst to generate H2. This work demonstrates a feasible strategy for the synthesis of highly efficient metal phosphide-loaded g-C3N4 for hydrogen generation.

Key words: Photocatalysis, CoP quantum dots, Electroless plating, H2 generation, g-C3N4