0D/2D heterojunction photocatalysts for improved full-spectrum-light-driven hydrogen evolution

Enhancing the full-spectrum light-driven hydrogen evolution of water splitting continues to be a pivotal challenge in the pursuit of advanced photocatalysts. In this study, the instability of MXene under light illumination has been effectively countered by affixing ultra-minor nanoparticles ZnO quan...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of materials chemistry. A, Materials for energy and sustainability Materials for energy and sustainability, 2024-10, Vol.12 (42), p.29278-29287
Main Authors: Zhan, Shu, Yang, Yang, Taixu, Lu, Sanja, Armakovi, Lin, Wang, Huilin, Hou, Nengrong, Tu, Pengcheng, Li, Weijun, Li, Weiyou, Yang
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Catalytic activity
Density functional theory
Excitation spectra
Heterojunctions
Heterostructures
Hydrogen
Hydrogen evolution
Hydrogen production
Light
MXenes
Nanoparticles
Photocatalysis
Photocatalysts
Quantum dots
Water splitting
Zinc oxide
Citations: Items that this one cites
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Enhancing the full-spectrum light-driven hydrogen evolution of water splitting continues to be a pivotal challenge in the pursuit of advanced photocatalysts. In this study, the instability of MXene under light illumination has been effectively countered by affixing ultra-minor nanoparticles ZnO quantum dots (QDs) onto the surface of the two-dimensional (2D) MXene substrate. This process ensures the high electronic conductivity of MXene, thereby enhancing its photocatalytic stability and maintaining hydrogen production efficiency. The loading of a small amount of ZnO QDs enables MXene to realize a 10-fold improvement under full-spectrum excitation. Combined with density functional theory (DFT) calculations, the results confirm that such excellent photocatalytic performance is mainly attributed to the increase of reactive active sites for hydrogen-extraction reaction (HER) on the surface of MXene, the fast carrier migration at the interface of heterostructure, and the improvement of the electron-hole pairs separation, thus resulting in the efficient full-spectrum solar catalytic activity and kinetic processes. Enhancing the full-spectrum light-driven hydrogen evolution of water splitting continues to be a pivotal challenge in the pursuit of advanced photocatalysts.
ISSN:2050-7488
2050-7496
DOI:10.1039/d4ta06179a