Fabrication of a non-semiconductor photocatalytic system using dendrite-like plasmonic CuNi bimetal combined with a reduced graphene oxide nanosheet for near-infrared photocatalytic H₂evolution

Abstract

Dendrite-like plasmonic CuNi bimetal was prepared and modified with reduced graphene oxide (rGO) nanosheets for improving the photocatalytic H2evolution rate.

Visible‐to‐NIR Photon Harvesting: Progressive Engineering of Catalysts for Solar‐Powered Environmental Purification and Fuel Production

“…The Ag–SiO 2 sample with the smallest Ag size ensues the broadest visible–NIR band absorption that manifests in the highest photoactivity. Additionally, in recent works of Zeng and co‐workers, they have constructed two Cu‐based visible–NIR photocatalysts of Cu nanoparticle–rGO nanosheets and dendrite‐like plasmonic CuNi bimetal–rGO composite based on the SPR absorption of Cu. In the composites, light‐induced electron–hole pairs are generated from the SPR effect of Cu.…”

The roles and mechanism of cocatalysts in photocatalytic water splitting to produce hydrogen

“…Metals are modified on the surface of semiconductors to form metal/semiconductor systems, which act as co-catalysts [43] to provide active sites and trapping electrons to separate photoinduced electron-hole pairs. When the frequency of the incident photons matches well with the inherent frequency of the free electrons on the surface of metal nanoparticles, which will lead to a collective oscillation, and the metal nanoparticles will have a strong absorption of photon energy, this effect is commonly known as localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) as shown in Fig.…”

“…In the past two decades, the semiconductor photocatalysts have been greatly developed by a large number of scholars from various countries and regions. Many photocatalytic materials have been investigated, including metal oxides or sulfides, such as TiO2 [19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28], CdS [29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38] and ZnCdS [15,[39][40][41][42], and the metal-free semiconductors such as rGO [43] and g-C3N4 [5,[44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54]. However, the photocatalytic activities of the most promising semiconductor photocatalysts are still not quite satisfied due to the easy recombination between charge carriers.…”

Metal‐facilitated Photocatalytic Nanohybrids: Rational Design and Promising Environmental Applications

“…Owing to the facile achievement of these excellent efficacy, metal‐hybridized semiconductors have been attracting more and more attention to serve as the desired photocatalyst. Typically, a surface plasmon resonance (SPR) effect was revealed to promptly separate electron‐hole pairs in CuNi‐hybridized graphene oxide nanosheets and the photocatalytic activity was observed in near infrared (NIR) range [18] . For CdS core‐Au shell photocatalyst, its photocatalytic activity was increased by more than 400 times in the splitting of water under irradiation of visible light compared to pure CdS [19] .…”