Graphitic carbon nitride microtubes for efficient photocatalytic overall water splitting: The morphology derived electrical field enhancement

Document Type

Journal Article

Publication Title

ACS Sustainable Chemistry and Engineering

Volume

8

Issue

38

First Page

14386

Last Page

14396

Publisher

American Chemical Society

School

School of Engineering

RAS ID

32876

Funders

National Science and Technology Major Project China Scholarship Council

Comments

Chen, L., Zhao, X., Duan, X., Zhang, J., Ao, Z., Li, P., ... Sun, H. (2020). Graphitic carbon nitride microtubes for efficient photocatalytic overall water splitting: The morphology derived electrical field enhancement. ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering, 8(38), 14386-14396. https://doi.org/10.1021/acssuschemeng.0c04097

Abstract

Copyright © 2020 American Chemical Society. The hollow morphology of photocatalysts significantly affects the light absorption, scattering, and charge separation ability. However, the mechanism that dictates the interaction between the light scattering and its modulation on electrical field for enhanced photocatalytic activity is not well understood hitherto. Herein, we investigate such a unique characteristic by designing three carbon nitride photocatalysts, e.g., graphitic carbon nitride microtubes (TCN), phosphorus-doped carbon nitride microrods (PCN), and bulk g-C3N4. The as-derived TCN exhibits 31 times higher photocatalytic activity in overall water splitting than pristine g-C3N4, which produces H2 and O2 at the reaction rates of 110.3 and 44.7 μmol h-1 g-1, respectively. The enhanced catalytic performance is attributed to the enhancement in electrical field, as evidenced by the improved charge separation and the finite element modeling simulation. Contributions from the specific surface area and band structure are also discussed. Unveiling the relationship between morphology and electrical field is expected to guide the rational design of morphology-oriented photocatalyst for highly efficient water splitting.

DOI

10.1021/acssuschemeng.0c04097

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