A Highly Efficient Composite Catalyst (Au/Ta3N5)/CdS for Photocatalytic Hydrogen Production

Abstract

As non-noble metal co-catalysts, Nitrides have received extensive attention for their high efficiency and low cost in photocatalytic hydrogen production. In this study, we develop a novel composite co-catalyst of Au/Ta3N5 that significantly enhanced the photocatalytic hydrogen production activity of CdS. The activity of photocatalyst (Au/Ta3N5)/CdS is 7.3 times of bare CdS and 2.2 times of Ta3N5/CdS. The proper capacitance and enhanced activity of Ta3N5 demonstrates the capacitance catalysis effect of Ta3N5, which improves the charges separation and storing of the photoexcited electrons from CdS. Au acts as an active site for proton reduction to further improve the activity.

Constructing In2S3/CdS/N-rGO Hybrid Nanosheets via One-Pot Pyrolysis for Boosting and Stabilizing Visible Light-Driven Hydrogen Evolution

“…Among which, chalcogenides and chalcogenide-based semiconductor materials have been widely investigated as photocatalysts for water splitting due to its inexpensive synthesis, low toxicity, large absorption coefficient, and narrow band gap energies [3]. The facile synthesis enables the rational design of chalcogenide catalysts with various shapes and structures and enriches the construction of hierarchical composites with other components to gain more interesting properties [4][5][6][7][8][9][10].…”

“…There are still several issues with CdS that limit the rate of hydrogen production from pure CdS particles [11]. Up to now, numerous steps have been taken to address these problems [9,10,12], of which building heterojunctions with other semiconductors has been proven to be one of most the effective strategies [13][14][15]. For example, CdS/g-C 3 N 4 nanoheterojunctions have been prepared using a hydrothermal method to improve its visible light photocatalytic performance for H 2 production [14].…”