A Hollow Porous CdS Photocatalyst.

Sun, Qiming; Wang, Ning; Yu, Jihong; Yu, Jimmy C · Adv Mater · 2018

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Efficient light harvesting and charge separation are of great importance in solar-energy conversion on photocatalysts. Herein, the synthesis of a novel hollow porous CdS photocatalyst with effectively restrained electron-hole recombination is reported. By using microporous zeolites as a host and a hard template, ultrasmall Pd and PdS nanoparticles can be anchored separately onto the inner and outer surfaces of a hollow CdS structure. The metallic Pd pulls the photoexcited electrons away from CdS while PdS pushes the holes for more thorough oxidation of the sacrificial agent. The final Pd@CdS/PdS product exhibits superior visible-light-driven photocatalytic H<sub>2</sub> evolution rate of up to 144.8 mmol h<sup>-1</sup> g<sup>-1</sup> . This is among the highest values of all the reported CdS-based catalysts. This synthetic approach may be used to fabricate other highly efficient catalysts with spatially separated cocatalysts.